32 TRANSACTIONS. 



PASTURE LANDb^. 



MOSES FIELD'S STATEMENT. 



My experiments indicate that plaster of paris improves old pastures 

 where the underlying rock is new red sand stone or the conglomerate 

 or pudding stone, which is made up of rounded granite boulders, and 

 pebbles cemented together, and slow of decomposition. In 1851, I 

 applied 500 lbs. of plaster to five acres in Leverett, north west of 

 Long Plain, upon the lower slope of Mount Mettawampe, with marked 

 results. In two months, the imperfection of the work of sowing was 

 indicated by Avaves in the grass, as distinctly as the waves in a field of 

 badly sown grain. In October, 1854, I sowed sixty acres. The ef- 

 fect was not visible the first season, nor till the latter part of the 

 second ; but, at the third season, the difference in the seed was fully 

 marked. On the more exhausted pasture lands, I think the quantity 

 of plaster should be two or three hundred pounds to the acre for im- 

 mediate effect. Pasture that for sixty years has borne little nutritious 

 feed, now, is clothed with waving grass. 



But where the underlying rock is granite, unstratified, abounding 

 in mica and iron, and susceptible of rapid decomposition, when ex- 

 posed to the atmosphere, my experiments in the application of plaster 

 have been followed by no visible effects. Of this character is the land 

 on the low hillocks, south east of Long Plain, in liCverett. 



ORCHARDS. 



WILLIAM P. DICKINSON'S REPORT. 



Dr. Trow, of Sunderland, has a hundred apple trees, set upon a 

 rich piece of ground, in the re <r of his house. The trees are very 

 straight and thrifty, and show that they have had good care. If the 

 the varieties prove to be what the Dr. sujiposed they were when he 

 purchased, they will soon repay his care and labor. The apple or- 

 chard, entered by John R. Robinson, of Sunderland, contains sixty 



