CORRESPONDENCE. 217 



Mr. Buckminster, — I am but a recent subscriber to 

 your paper, but I understand you practise differently 

 from many farmers in our part of the country in regard 

 to your treatment of low lands. I hear that you are in 

 the practice of ploughing them and then seeding to 

 grass without having rotted the sod ; that is, that you 

 sow your grass on the furrow, and without sowing any 

 kind of grain with it. If this be so, you will oblige at 

 least one subscriber by stating what has been your suc- 

 cess, and whether you expect a crop of grass large 

 enough for mowing the next season. B. 



South Andover, August 6, 1839. 



In answer to our correspondent from South Andover, 

 we can say we have for some years been in the practice 

 of sowing down all kinds of land in the fall to grass, 

 and without going through the process of planting. 

 But we have derived the greatest benefit from thus 

 treating all our loiv lands where the plough can be 

 made to run. These lands can never be planted to 

 any advantage, and yet they want to be moved once in 

 a few years, for the wild grasses will creep in and take 

 the place of better company unless large quantities of 

 manure — more than we can spare — are often applied 

 to the surface. 



We formerly practised planting such land either with 

 corn or with potatoes ; but we uniformly found that 

 when we sowed it down to grass it would lie dead and 

 heavy ; and, though for a year or two we could cut a 

 decent crop, it would soon turn wild again, and we 

 were scarcely repaid our labor of going through with 

 this long process. We therefore rather chose to let 

 such lands lie and yield a small harvest, than to waste 

 our strength and expend our manure where it turned to 

 so little profit. We now find that, when managed in a 

 proper manner, these lands are the best of any for 

 grass, and that there is no kind of need to plant them in 

 order to get them into the best of grass. 

 19* 



