54 THE COW 



laxge stones and trees and level enough to admit; 

 the use of modem farm machinery ought to be 

 plowed and, for a season or two at least, put into 

 the regular rotation of the farm. A pasture that 

 can be handled in this way does not constitute a 

 real problem. 



There are other fields too valuable to abandon 

 but not practicable to till. These should be helped 

 out with applications of lime, acid-phosphate and 

 grass-seed— never forgetting the grass-seed — ^be- 

 cause pasture failure is not a question of depleted 

 fertility alone, but is also due to the fact that the 

 grass plants have died out and there are no new 

 ones to take their place. Grass plants do not live 

 forever, any more than do the trees in an orchard, 

 and the only method of renewal that we know is 

 scattering grass seed in early spring. Much has 

 been said about this, and many kinds of seed have 

 been suggested ; but we may at least remember that 

 the ideal pasture is a mixture of blue-grass and 

 white clover; so whatever else we do, let us not 

 forget the "grass that made Kentucky famous" and 

 the plant which is said to furnish two-thirds of the 

 commercial honey crop of eastern North America. 



Another class of so-called pastures ought never 

 to have been cleared of forests in the beginning. 

 They have in them no possibilities to justify the 

 expenditure of either labor or fertility, and the 

 quicker Nature takes them back to her kindly pro- 

 tection, the better. With them, the best policy is 



