PART III. 

 MEADOWS AND THEIR MANAGEMENT. 



Upon the proper selection of soils and situations for meadows will 

 depend largely their permanency and their productiveness. The soil, its- 

 condition and situation are the most important elements of success. 

 Above all things the soil must be fertile, or it should be made so by abund- 

 ant fertilization. Poor soils will not produce rich grasses. Stable ma- 

 nure must be freely used on the soil if it is sterile in its character. Before 

 such an application, however, the land must be deeply broken and under- 

 drained if very dry or very wet. It is a well known fact tnat underdrain- 

 ing dries wet soils and gives the capacity to dry ones of retaining humid- 

 ity. It stimulates plant growth earlier in the spring and keeps it up later 

 in the fall, because it carries away the cold subterranean water, and by 

 doing so the lower portion of the soil is warmed by diminishing evapora- 

 tion. Droughts are never so disastrous upon well drained soils as upon 

 undrained ones. When the soil is saturated with water, plant food be- 

 comes so much diluted that the roots must take in a larger quantity of 

 fluid to nourish the plants, and the hay is greatly injured by this excess of 

 moisture. Many soils that are intractable may be made mellow and well 

 fitted for the growing of grasses by thorough draining. Drainage also 

 makes all fertilizing matter have a better effect. The productiveness of 

 the land when drained is largely increased, for the reason that the roots- 

 are enabled to range through a wider extent of soil in search of plant food 

 By permitting the roots of the plants to penetrate deeper, drainage makes 

 them more independent of the moisture of the surface soil, and so has the 

 same effect as a rain fall. 



Another great advantage which meadows receive from proper drain- 

 age is in the prevention of the formation in the soil of acids which are 

 injurious to vegetation. Another is that it arrests or checks the heaving 

 out of grasses in winter by freezing. Drainage also lessens the tendency 

 to the formation of a hard crust on the surface after rains with super- 

 vening hot weather. Above all, drainage greatly facilitates that reaction 

 which prepares the organic and mineral matter in the soil for plant food. 

 All soils saturated with water are placed in a condition that stops the 

 decay of vegetable matter incorporated with it. The mineral matters also 

 require to be exposed to the air before they are put in a condition to be 

 readily assimilated by plants. 



Underdraining is but little practiced in the South and yet there is no 

 work that is more essential to a good meadow. Drains should be made 

 from forty to sixty feet apart and should be put at least three feet beneath 

 the surface of the ground, with an outlet that will carry the water from. 



