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63 
much of the ground uncovered. This may be obviated by thick seeding, using 
21 or, better, 3 bushels of seed per acre. The gaps may be prevented by sowing 
with it a few pounds of redtop seed. But as. the latter multiplies annually from 
seeds dropping, it would in a few years root out the orchard grass. In common with 
many others I prefer red clover with orchard grass. It fills the gaps and matures at 
the same time with the orchard grass ; the mixture makes good pasture and good hay; 
but if mowed more than twice a year, or grazed too soon after the second mowing, 
the clover will rapidly fail. One peck of red clover seed and 6 pecks of orchard 
grass seed is good proportion per acre. 
After being cut it has been found to grow 4 inches in less than three days. Sheep 
leave all other grasses if they can find this, and acre for acre it will sustain twice as 
many sheep or other stock as Timothy. Cut at the proper age it makes a much bet- 
ter hay than Timothy, and is greatly preferred by animals, being easier to masticate, 
digest, and assimilate; in fact more like green grass in flavor, tenderness, and solu- 
bility. 
Mr. J. 8. Gould, of New York, says: 
The testimony that has been collected from all parts of the world for two centuries 
past establishes the place of this species among the very best of our forage grasses, 
and we have not a sha cow of a doubt that the interests of our graziers and dairymen 
would be greatly promoted by its more extended cultivation. It is always found in 
the rich old pastures of England, where an acre of land can be relied on to fatten a 
bullock and four sheep. It is admirably adapted for growing in the shade, no grass 
being equal to it in this respect, except the rough-stalked meadow grass (Poa tri- 
vialis). It receives the name of orchard grass from this circumstance. We have 
seen it growing in great luxuriance in dense old New England orchards, where no 
other grass exeept Poa trivialis would grow at all. It affords a good bite earlier in 
the spring than any other grass except the meadow foxtail (Alopecurus pratensis). 
lt affords a very great amount of aftermath, being exceeded in this respect by po 
other grass except Kentucky blue grass (Poa pratensis), and it continues to send out 
root-leaves until very late in the autumn. When sown with other grasses its tend- 
ency to form tussocks is very much diminished ; indeed it is always unprofitable to 
sow if alone in meadows or pastures, as it stands too thin upon the ground to makea 
profitable use of the land, and the filling up of the interspaces with other varieties 
greatly improves the quality of the orchard grass by restraining its rankness and 
making it more delicate. 
From Colman’s Rural World : 
Orchard grass makes good winter pasturage, equally as good as blue grass, and far 3 
better pasturage in seasons of drought than blue grass, as it is a deeper and larger- 
rooted plant and resists drought better. When once established it can be fed as 
closely as any other grass. and is no harder on land than any other. Indeed, land 
pastured in orchard grass will continue to improve in fertility. If half of each of 
our farms were well seeded to orchard grass it would be a great edvantage to them. 
From the Farmer’s Home Journal: 
This is one of the most valuable of all the grasses, and is better adapted to the 
South than any other with which we are acquainted. Its rapidity of growth and 
the luxuriance of its aftermath, its power of enduring drought and the cropping of 
cattle, commended it highly to the farmer, especially as a pasture grass, and it is 
rapidly growing in favor. It starts earlier in the spring, and continues growing 
later in the fall, and starts again more quickly after being cut, than any other grass, 
thus furnishing both the earliest and latest grazing. Orchard grass is less exhaust- 
ing to the soil than Timothy. It will endure considerable shade. In a porous sub- 
soil its fibrous roots extend to a great depth. It does well on any soil of even mod- 
_« esate fertility which is not too wet for grass, and will grow and thrive where no other 
