NECESSITY FOR HEAVY MANURING. 69 



cast at the rate of one and one-half to two bushels to the acre. It 

 is then plowed under about three inches deep with a light one-horse 

 plow. If seeded to grass the surface is rolled before the grass seed 

 is sown, and harrowed with a chain harrow or brush harrow. The 

 brush harrow, as it is well understood, is an improvised harrow 

 made by the farmer, consisting of branches about ten or twelve feet 

 long, which are driven into holes bored in a piece of scantling ten 

 feet long and attached in the usual way to the whiffletree. The harrow 

 shown above answers as a smoothing, leveling and brush harrow, and 

 is convenient, cheap and useful for many purposes, and is a good 

 substitute, sometimes, for the roller. 



I have put on as high as eight cords or twenty-four tons per acre. 

 Of course the object of this heavy manuring, as has been referred to, 

 is not so much for the wheat crop, as it would cost more than the 

 product, but it is for the after crop of grass. 



If this manure had to be purchased in the vicinity of New York 

 it would cost $72 per acre, which of course is more than double what 

 the wheat crop would sell for, but it will be understood that the crop 

 of wheat is never expected to pay for the manure. It is the after 

 crop of grass that we are laying the foundation for, and here is where 

 the profit of this heavy manuring comes in. The straw from the 

 wheat we consider about pays for the labor of sowing and harvesting 

 the crop. It will be understood that this heavy manuring for a wheat 

 crop that is to be succeeded by grass, is only on fields where oats or 

 corn have been grown the year previous. If a root crop had been 

 grown the previous year, which is our usual custom, there would be 

 no necessity for manuring, as the heavy manuring used for the root 

 crop is ample to carry a crop of wheat and grass for succeeding years. 



(Mr. H.) This. work of spreading manure is a slow and laborious 

 one. There is an excellent machine made for this purpose which 

 saves the greater part of this labor. It breaks up and scatters the 

 manure, no matter how coarse it is, and spreads it much more evenly 

 than it could be done by hand, and with great rapidity. I think 

 the invention of this machine is a very valuable aid to our agriculture. 

 It will spread from five loads up to twenty loads per acre, and forty 

 loads is an easy day's work. 



Q. Is it not the custom generally amongst wheat growers on a large 

 scale on the prairies or in the extensive wheat lands of California to use 

 the wheat drills, instead of sowing broadcast, as you advise ? 



A. Yes. They do not care so much for the grass there. The 

 wheat crop is what they are after. They sow whatever crop they can 

 market to best advantage, and that is wheat. But we are working 

 under different circumstances. 



