GREEN CROPS. 161 



to enrich, as it has a broad top, also a tap-root, that 

 dies in two years, and rots in the ground and turns to 

 manure. 



The expense of preparing an acre of plain light land 

 thus may be, — 



Three ploughings, $^6 00 



Two bushels buckwheat, 2 00 



Sowing and harrowing in twice, 1 00 



Rolling down, 50 



S9~50' 



Nine dollars and a half will, in many cases, cover the 

 whole expense of preparing the land for the grass-seed. 



Now you have turned in three green crops, and your 

 land, if it was suitable for buckwheat, will be richer 

 than if coated with five cords, or twenty loads, of ma- 

 nure. The cost of twenty loads of manure, in your 

 town, Avould not be less than $20, and the hauling and 

 spreading would be $5 more = $25. Then you must 

 plough once, $2 = $27. To the $9 50 we must add 

 the charge of the loss of the use of the land one sum- 

 mer ; but, as four or five acres of such reduced land 

 would be required to pasture one cow, we cannot call 

 this loss more than $2. Then our account stands 

 $11 50 for green-crop manuring, and $27 for barn- 

 yard manuring. 



If the green crops should prove one half as bene- 

 ficial to your land as the purchased manure, you will 

 thus be a gainer by preferring these crops ; but we 

 think we are warranted-, from our own experience on 

 many acres, in repeating that the three green crops, 

 well ploughed in, will prove fully equal to twenty 

 loads of manure on an acre. 



If your land be distant from the barn, or from the 

 purchased manure, the diiference of the expense will 

 be still greater. But you cannot often purchase ma- 

 nure at any price, and you must resort to some kinds 

 of green crops, or suffer your distant lands to lie sterile. 



Other green crops are often recommended, as clover. 



