168 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



April 



produce more than a ton of grass plowed into the 

 ground. lie said further that one-quarter of the 

 fructifying matter of a piece of ground was in the 

 atmosphere. One ton of hay he knew would 

 make 2 44-100 tons of manure solid, and as much 

 more liquid, and one cow will make 30 tons of 

 manure, which he considered too much for any 

 acre of land in the State. 



Mr. BusHNELL, of Sheffield, being called on 

 said that, from several years' experience, he had 

 found that sheep would improve pastures more 

 than anything else. If briars and bushes were cut 

 once and a flock of sheep turned into the pasture 

 they would prevent their growth by cropping the 

 young shoots and eventually killing the roots. 

 He thought that all farmers had to do to improve 

 their pastures was to keep sheep, and by this 

 means his land had improved fifty per cent. In 

 plowing lands, sheep are excellent, and on the 

 large quantity of lands that cannot be plowed 

 sheep would undoubtedly improve them. He 

 would advise every farmer to keep sheep, as they 

 were profitable in every sense. 



Mr. PiNKtiAM thought we produced too much 

 now, and thus reduced the price of everything ; 

 whereas, if there was a smaller production the far- 

 mer would be benefited. He wanted to see the 

 legislation for the farmer stopped, as he thought 

 this was the most potent cause of the poor 

 position of the farmer. Fancy farmers, said Mr. 

 Pinkham, want to increase the productions so 

 as to make living cheap, but he thought the 

 •way to improve pastures was to give a profit to 

 the farmer, and return back to the soil what was 

 taken from it. The gentleman then spoke of po- 

 tatoes and apples, but being reminded that he 

 was speaking on matter foreign to the subject, he 

 resumed his seat. 



Mr. Wexuerell, of Boston, said that pastures 

 can be divided into two classes, those that can be 

 cultivated and those that cannot, and for the lat- 

 ter he recommended turning in, and the use of 

 plaster. He spoke of a man in Harwich who 

 had land with brush so high that it would hide a 

 cow, and he cut it down and burned it, and after 

 he had scattered 100 to 200 pounds of plaster to 

 the acre, it furnished the best kind of pasture, un- 

 til now a dairy is fed a great portion of the time 

 from it. He strongly recommended the use of 

 plaster, and on lands where this would not do, 

 he thought guano or the superphosphates would 

 be good, and in relation to guano, he repeated 

 his former statement that he was confident it was 

 a fertilizer. 



Mr. Proctor, of Danvers, said he had labored 

 on one farm for 20 years, consisting of GO acres. 

 This was divided by stone wall into three lots, and 

 it was not as good pasture as there was in the 

 eastern section of the State. It had never been 



overstocked and had always been improving. 

 Most of our pasture lands, said he, cannot be 

 plowed, and it is not expedient to fertilize them, 

 as it costs too much, but if a farmer changed his 

 pastures and did not let them be too close fed, and 

 spread the droppings of the cattle in the spring, 

 they would never grow poor. He thought the 

 manure from sheep the richest that could be ap- 

 plied to the land. He mentioned the case of a 

 neighbor of his, who, for a premium offered by 

 the Agricultural Society, improved thirteen acres 

 of land. He turned into the lot twenty sheep, 

 and in three years time they had killed off all the 

 wild shrubs and bushes, and now the land was as 

 good as any around it, and the premium was 

 awarded to him. He urged gentlemen to confine 

 themselves to the question under discussion. 



Mr. Laturop, of South Hadley, said that in his 

 part of the State plaster produced a greater effect 

 than in any other section. He purchased his 

 farm thirty years ago, and it consisted of 600 

 acres. He had found it hard then to get enough 

 feed off it to support the cattle necessary to carry 

 it on, but he applied plaster to it, and then he 

 found he could not buy cattle enough to crop the 

 feed. When he took his farm he kept a flock of 

 300 or 400 sheep, but he found his land deterior- 

 ating so much that he went to using plaster, and 

 the effect was wonderful, and now he applies 100 

 lbs. to the acre once in two years. He keeps en- 

 tirely fallow cows and beef cattle, and they are in 

 the finest order. 



Mr. Howard, editor of the Cultioator, said he 

 had been often on Mr. Lathrop's land, and it was 

 an elevated alluvial soil of the Connecticut, the 

 river having left the bare clay partially covered 

 with sand, and he believed it to be a fact that 

 wherever this description of soil crops out plas- 

 ter is of immense benefit. 



Mr. Fearing, of Hingham, said he had a farm 

 of 28 acres in Hingham, on which he had fed sheep 

 and cattle for 40 years, and had never applied 

 manure to it. Although a part of it was rocky, it 

 was in excellent heart now, and the best in Hing- 

 ham, and would bring $oO to $55 per acre at 

 auction to-day. He recommended good fences 

 and mowing bushes and briars and burning them, 

 then stocking the pasture very heavily one, two, 

 or three years, and they would take care the 

 bushes and briars did not grow again. He had 

 used 20 acres this way last year, and it would do 

 well. He thought fertilizers too expensive, and 

 plaster and lime had no effect on lands on the 

 sea-coast, and he said he would not allow any man 

 to cover his farm w^ith it, even if he would do it 

 gratuitously. 



Mr. Melvin spoke briefly of plowing in crops, 

 recommending the plan on the ground that we 

 had worked cur farms too hard. 



