FARMERS' REGISTER— GAMA GRASS— HESSIAN FLY, &c. 



401 



and harrowing; fhcm in. The plants have then the 

 benefit of the autumn rains and strike their roots 

 sut!icicnt]y deep before winter to bear the cold, 

 and will produce a cro]) of scad the following year. 

 When sown with small grain, they are oversha- 

 dowed and kept back by it, until harvest, when 

 they are suddenly exposed to a burning sun, at the 

 most trying time of the year. All this is obviated 

 by sowing on stubble, and I have known a gentle- 

 man in Buckingham succeed by adopting this 

 plan. * * # * # 



WILD PKA VIAKS. 



I have often been told by the old people, of the 

 astonishing luxuriance of the tall wild pea vine, 

 in old times, on lands now the poorest — of the great 

 quantities of food which it afforded ibr stock, and 

 the extreme mellowness which it caused in the 

 soil. It has perennial roots reseml)ling the sweet 

 potatoe, which were eaten with avidity by hogs, 

 and its vines, leaves and fruit were greedily de- 

 voured by horses, cows and sheep. So that its 

 very value seems to have caused its almost utter 

 extermination. With so much worth and so many 

 enemies, is it not entitled to a single friend.' In 

 short, would you advise a crop of it.' I have lately 

 found a few seed, and think it might be advanta- 

 geously used, either as an improver of land, or as 

 fodder. It certainly afforded much manure to our 

 lands in former times. At least they have become 

 very poor since itsdcparture. Whenever it becomes 

 necessary to cultivate its ground in another crop, 

 its roots might be fed to hogs, or ploughed up and 

 transferred to other land. 



* * # * # 



I w-as much pleased with some very timely and 

 very sensible inquiries by your Louisa correspon- 

 dent, who it seems, like your humble servant, and 

 perhaps many others of your subscribers, lives on 

 jioor land. W hat would you think of lengthening 

 the rotation on such lands.' Or at least, of. culti- 

 vating them much seldomer in a hoe crop.' The 

 greater returns of small grain and grass crops, 

 might, perhaps, make ample amends ibr any defi- 

 cit in the crop of corn. I consider, hill side ditches 

 and horizontal ploughing as the best means of pre- 

 serving poor land, and consequently of restoring 

 it, at least of its original fertility, and as the great- 

 est discovery in agriculture tor o\ir middle country, 

 which has been made since its settlement. 



GAUIA GRASS. 



Prince Edward. 



I have long known the article described under 

 the name of " Gama Grass" in the 4tli number of 

 the Register. Fifteen years ago, finding the cattle 

 fond of eating it, I scattered the seed in tiie fence 

 corners, and in that way propagated it to some ex- 

 tent, though I have never regularly cultivated it. 

 There is now, in one of my meadow s, a patch eigh- 

 teen or twenty feet square, almost exclusively of 

 this grass. It contends well with all other grasses, 

 but 1 find it in time overpowered in the fence cor- 

 ners by bushes and briers. It would doubtless 

 need cultivation, if cut six or eight times in the 

 year. I suspect the variety in this vicinity is 

 larger than those described in your Iburth number. 

 It has nine or ten seed on every spike — I have 

 lound but one with fewer than nine. A friend 



Vol. 1—51 



brought half a dozen seed to me from Newbern the 

 other day — (where they sell at one dollar per 

 quart) — evidently smaller than those growing in 

 this neighborhood. Ours is, however, evidently 

 a tripsacum, grows most luxuriantly and makes 

 fine hay. I measured a stalk the other day nine 

 feet in length. Its spikes are generally cylindri- 

 cal. They sometimes grow out double, and then 

 are flattened on one side. * # * * 



IIKSSIAN FLY AND Sr-lt'f IT! WHEAT; 



About the year 1800, for the fifst flmfe, ttiy fa- 

 ther discovered Hessian fly in his wheat J ju^tthen^ 

 for the first time, the clover on the farm produced 

 slavering with the horses. Can there be a con- 

 nexion betw^ecn these evils.' 1 know the latter is 

 ascribed to a little parasitical vine growing on the 

 clover. On several occasions, I have known seed- 

 wheat scalded to remove smut, and the crop pro- 

 duced was exempt from Hessian fly. I know it is 

 sometimes exempt when there has' been no scald- 

 ing ; yet with other facts it alTords ground for sus- 

 picion, that some minute insect artificer, (I suspect 

 a little black tickling insect, which appears in 

 numberless multitudes during harvest, and which 

 appeared for the first time about 1800,) produces 

 the evil by depositing its eggs in the grain. The 

 insect hatched from the egg, I know, is very dif- 

 ferent from this one, but these creatures pass 

 through many transmigrations. A gentleman 

 took some seed wheat from Virginia to Alabama. 

 The succeeding crop was well supplietl with Hes- 

 sian fly, and stocked a neighborhood previously 

 exenq)t. To scald seed-wheat, the water should 

 be heated on the margin of a running stream, into 

 w hich the basket of wheat may be plunged after 

 dipping it for a moment, into boiling water. 



Last year, having the misfortune to have some 

 of my wheat srautted, I kept some smutted grains 

 from which hatched a number of worms, which 

 grew more than half an inch long, and which I 

 suspected to be the cause of the evil. I had long 

 susj)ected this disease and several others to be pro- 

 duced by insects — for I could not well conceive 

 how the atmosphere could contain a poison de- 

 stroying one crop and not touching another imme- 

 diately adjoining. 



I have known smut in wheat entirely cured by 

 scalding the seed in ley, and by rolling in quick 

 lime after wetting. In both of these processes, I 

 I)resume there is heat enough to destroy the egg 

 of the insect. I have also known seed-wheat soak- 

 ed several days in strong but cold ley, without i)re- 

 venting smut. I suspect that it has been heat 

 which gave efficacy to niost of the pickles in curing 

 smut. 



MARLING. 



King William, Nov. 7, 1833. 



It gives me the highest ]>leasure to observe the 

 rapid progress marling is making among us. Popu- 

 lation being the natural result of agriculture, I 

 doubt not, but marl is destined, not only to enable 

 Lower Virginia to retain in her bosom her native 

 born sons, but to give her many by adoption. It 

 is important to convince that class of farmers 

 who labor in their fields with very few servants, 

 or none, that it is to their interest to use it. Two 

 of that class in this neighborhootl liave commenced 



