202 MARKET GARDENING. 



nitrate salts. Of late, in Europe, much attention has 

 been directed to the use of a new fertilizer known as slag 

 phosphate, a by-product of the Basic process of making 

 Bessemer steel. This slag phosphate seems especially 

 adapted for grass, and its trial is recommended. 



In many localities the profits of grass land can be 

 increased over fourfold by means of irrigation, and its 

 practice should unquestionably be pursued when the 

 conditions are favorable ; that is, when water in large 

 volume may be cheaply obtained, which, flowing by 

 gravity from more elevated sources, can be distributed 

 beneath the surface by underground conductors, in open 

 ditches, or upon the surface. The writer once visited 

 the irrigated farms outside of Bedford, England, and 

 was amazed at the grass development. Subsequently, 

 visiting Barking, below London, he saw crops of rye 

 grown which produced a fresh cutting every three weeks 

 of ten tons to the acre. He was informed that one hun- 

 dred tons of green rye grass had been cut to the acre, in 

 a single summer. 



While irrigation, in parts of the West, and on the 

 Pacific slope, is a thing of everyday agricultural practice, 

 enforced by reason of climatic conditions, and cheaply 

 practiced by reason of elevated water supplies, the sys- 

 tem is almost unknown in the rainfall States. Few 

 localities can draw cheap and plentiful supplies of water 

 from mountain sides, but even under the expense of 

 pumping from rivers, it will pay to do it on tracts suffi- 

 ciently large and level for the advantageous distribution 

 of water. 



Over three thousand varieties of plants of the grass 

 family are known and described by botanists, and while 

 by far the greater part are of such character as at once 

 to remove them from the list of farm forage plants, 

 there remains a vast number not cultivated, scarcely 

 tested, but worthy of experiment. The list of seeds of 



