356 OLD PASTURE LANDS. 



white." Another says, in answer to question 16, 

 What is the best mode of renovating old, worn-out pas- 

 tures? " Plough, manure, and re-seed. Some have 

 sown rye with the grass-seed, and then let the stock 

 feed on the rye, as it will not produce any seed-stalks. 

 It sometimes lasts three years. This method has been 

 put in practice with marked success. On our hills, 

 ground plaster or gypsum has brought in the white 

 clover the next year after sowing." Another practical 

 farmer says : " The best method I have found is to 

 plough in forty loads of good stable manure to the acre, 

 plant, hoe, and kill the bushes and moss, then seed down 

 with redtop and white clover, instead of taking a crop 

 of rye without adding any thing to the soil, then seeding 

 down with 'barn chaff,' as many do;" while an ex- 

 perienced farmer of another section says : " If the pas- 

 ture lands can be ploughed, do it in the month of June, 

 say seven inches deep, harrow thoroughly, sow one 

 hundred pounds of Peruvian guano and three pecks of 

 buckwheat per acre, harrowing them in' at the same 

 time. Sow as much grass-seed and of the kind best 

 adapted to the soil as you please, and bush it in. 

 I have tried twenty acres at a time with good suc- 

 cess." 



Another writes me as follows, in answer to question 

 16 : "It can be done in various ways. I have a piece 

 of pasture land near my house that bore hardly a spire 

 of grass, and nothing else, except five-finger and other 

 weeds that usually grow on old, worn-out pine plains, 

 and I commenced twenty-four years ago by sowing 

 Timothy and redtop, and a bushel and a half of plaster 

 of Paris per acre, once in two years, up to this time ; 

 the grass increased from year to year, so as to cover 

 most of the land in thirteen years. Ten years ago I 

 commenced ploughing it. I ploughed about one acre, 



