90 Bichard DrAscher's Almanac and Garden Manual 



"My meadow consists of one hundred acres of alluvial land, near 

 Augusta. * * =*< In winter I employ but four men, who are 

 enough to work my packing-press; in summer, when harvesting, 

 double that number. In autumn I usually scarify both ways with 

 sharp, steel-toothed harrows, and sow over the stubble a peck of red 

 clover per acre, which, with volunteer vetches, comes off about the 

 middle of May. The second yield of clover is uniformh' eaten up by 

 grasshoppers. The tap root rernains to fertilize the then coming 

 Guinea grass, which should be but from two to three feet high. * * * 

 On such land as mine, it will afford three or four cuttings if the season 

 is propitious. I use an average of five tons of gypsum soon after the 

 first cutting, and about the same quantity of the best commercial fer- 

 tilizers, in March and April. * * * The grass, which is cut before 

 noon, is put up with horse sulky rakes, in cocks, before sun-down. '" 



Mr. Moore's income from this field was from seven thousand to 

 ten thousand dollars a year. 



Mr. Goelsel, of Mobile, says : 'Tt is undoubtedly the most profitable 

 soiling plant yet introduced, and also promises to be the jAant for our 

 Southern hay stacks, provided it can be cut every three or four weeks. 



]^ote.--Eecognizing all the above, I would say, that great care 

 must be taken not to sow this grass near cultivated lands. If done, 

 it should not be allowed to go to seed, as the wind will blow them off 

 from the stalks, and when it gets amongst cane or other crops it causes 

 a great deal of trouble. It is almost impossible to get it out of the land. 



RESCUE GRASS. 



. ( Ceratochloa aiisti^aJis or Bromus Schraderi.j 



It is an annual winter grass. It varies in the time of starting growth. 

 I have seen it ready for mowing the first of October and furnish fre- 

 quent cuttings till April. Again, it may not start before January, nor 

 be ready to cut till February. This depends upon the moisture and 

 depression of temperature. When once started, its growth, after the 

 successive cuttings or grazings, is very rapid. It is tender, very sweet, 

 and stock eat it greedily. It makes also a good hay. It produces an 

 immense quantity of leaves. On loose soil some of it may be i^ulled 

 out by animals grazing it. I have seen it bloom as earlj* as November 

 when the season had favored it, and no grazing or cutting were per- 

 mitted. Oftener it makes little start before January. But whether 

 late or early starting, it may be grazed or mowed frequently, until 

 April, it still will mature seed. It has become naturalized in limited 

 portions of Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, and perhaps other 

 States. It is a very pretty grass in all its stages ; and especialy so 

 when the culms, two or three feet high, are gracefully bending with 

 the weight of the diffuse panicle with its many pedicelled flattened 

 spikelets, each an inch or more long and with twelve to sixteen flowers. 



I would not, however, advise sowing this grass on poor land with 

 the expectation of getting a remunerative return. It tillers abundantly 

 under favorable conditions. 



