112 MASSACHUSETTS AGRICULTURE. 



RENOVATED PASTURES. 



PLYMOUTH. 



Statement of Spencer Leonard. 



My pasture, containing about fifteen acres, came into my pos- 

 session in the spring of 1855. More than three-fourths of it 

 was cold, moist swale, with clay sub-soil, free from stones. It 

 had, like a large proportion of the pastures in Plymouth 

 County, been managed by taking off all the feed that could be 

 obtained and putting nothing back in return. As a result, the 

 lowest places produced little but bushes and sour grasses which 

 the cattle would not eat, except early in the season, while the 

 remainder was partially covered with laurel, rose-ljushes and 

 hard-hack. 



In 1855, 1 mowed the bushes where they were thickest and 

 Ijurncd them ; then ploughed about four acres and harrowed as 

 well as was practicable, sowing grass-seed on about half of it in 

 September, and on the rest the next spring, applying no manure 

 except on a small portion of it. The result was a partial 

 failure. I succeeded in destroying a portion of the bushes, but 

 where I applied no manure there was but little improvement in 

 quality or quantity of feed. Where the manure was put there 

 was much more grass of a better quality, but not being properly 

 drained, the cultivated grasses died out in a year or two and the 

 wild, sour grasses took their place. By this time several acres 

 more had been ploughed and treated in a similar manner, with 

 like results. 



I now commenced where I l)egan in 1855, but being, like 

 many other farmers, in debt and short of money, I was under 

 the necessity of adopting some comparatively cheap method of 

 draining. As my pasture is somewhat undulating, I ploughed 

 in lands two rods wide, leaving the dead furrows as deep as 

 possible and of nearly an even grade, that the surface water 

 might run off freely ; cutting across ditches Avhere necessary, 

 and harrowed it well, using the grub-hoe and rake where the 

 harrow would not smooth it sufficiently, then applied what 

 stable manure I could spare from my other crops, the chip-dirt 

 and other scrapings I could find about my buildings, some 



