142 BOAKD OF AGRICULTURE. 



Captain Moore. I use almost entirely herd's grass. I 

 do not use any redtop at all ; and I will tell you why. The 

 reason why I do not use it is because I sell my hay in the 

 market, and the purchasers will give me more for herd's 

 grass than they will for redtop ; and Dr. Goessmann will tell 

 you that the same plat of ground will produce considerably 

 more weight of herd's grass or timothy than it will of red- 

 top. I want to get all the weight I can. 



Mr. Taft. How much seed to the acre? 



Captain Moore. I put on about two and a half pecks, or 

 twenty quarts. Some other parts of this land that I sowed 

 two years ago with clover has produced three crops 

 this year. I have to mow it pretty early, because it will 

 fall down if I don't cut it. 



Question. Is this land underdrained ? 



Captain Moore. No, sir ; it lies in strips about thirty 

 rods long and one hundred feet wide, divided and sur- 

 rounded by open ditches. It is not troubled by any surface 

 flowage on it. 



I find that the crops on that land, in less than four years, 

 have paid for all the labor and for all the fertilizers, and I 

 have the land left there in such a condition that it would sell 

 for $200 an acre. 



Now, gentlemen, I am not going to say to those of you 

 who are situated inland, that it would be desirable for you 

 to lay out as much money on an acre of land as I am laying 

 out on this land to which I refer ; but I am nearer a market, 

 and I am warranted in doin2[ it. 



There is a piece of that land that has been reclaimed in 

 another way, and I want to have you see the difference. 

 The ground, as I told you, was so soft that we could not put 

 a team on it to plow it ; but we did plow it. I cannot tell 

 you how much it cost an acre ; but it was slow work, because 

 we plowed it by putting a long rope through a snatch-block, 

 with four horses to pull the plow and another horse to drag 

 the plow back, and two or three men to handle the plow, 

 because it was rough and bad ground to turn over, and that 

 made it pretty expensive plowing. I plowed three or four 

 acres of that sort of land, and it produced a moderate crop ; 

 and afterwards, there not being substance enough in the land 



