THE GRASS LANDS OF WESTERN NEW YORK. 
95 
THE GRASS LANDS OF WESTERN NEW 
YORK. 
If we draw lines from the outlet of Lake Erie to 
the northeast corner of Wyoming county, and thence 
to Pennsylvania, the tract of country south and 
west is not generally favorable to the production of 
winter wheat. It is of the kind called grass land. 
At its first settlement, however, winter wheat and 
all other crops of the Middle States were eminently 
successful, and the region was valuable for abun¬ 
dant production, and numerous springs and streams 
of excellent water, and the peculiar salubrity of its 
climate; exempt mainly, as it ever has been, from 
the ordinary diseases of a country recently settled. 
At the first settlement of a thickly wooded coun¬ 
try, grain must necessarily be the chief production, 
for domestic animals cannot be kept in large num¬ 
bers. Of all cereal crops, wheat is the most valu¬ 
able, and receives the greatest share of attention. 
But that which necessity reasonably originates, be¬ 
comes, in the course of time, habit, and frequently 
continues in full force long after the cause has 
ceased. Thus it was, for many years, a part of the 
farming system in this region to sow winter wheat, 
where experience annually demonstrated that it 
could not succeed under the ordinary mode of culti¬ 
vation. The farmers were discouraged. Expe¬ 
dients might have been attempted, but in the new 
land of the west they could do as they had done 
before. Custom had taught them to like the axe 
better than the plow, and emigration became the 
order of the day. Yet the soil was not exhausted. 
Spring wheat and a proper system of plowing the 
earth into beds so as to drain the soil, were scarcely 
known, and yet more rarely practised. 
Strange whims and conceits existed here. Many 
people believed that not only would cattle and 
horses refuse to eat clover hay, but that if eaten it 
was poisonous. Others thought that the land must 
be seeded down after clearing, and that in the end 
the good grass would die out, and that it must be let 
alone, for if once plowed up it would be destroyed 
for ever. And so it would have been. Under the 
operation of a retentive soil, an impervious subsoil, 
and a surface abounding in the inequalities called 
cradle-knolls, sufficient plowing to raise the land 
into ridges, so that the water might escape, was 
nowhere more necessary ; and abundant examples 
now illustrate that it has been followed by effects 
the most beneficial. It may be added, that the first 
crop raised in doing this, will at least repay the ex¬ 
pense incurred. 
There has been much speculation as to the 
causes why winter wheat cannot now be produced. 
It is generally supposed, even among chemists, 
that they result from a deficiency of lime in the 
soil. But if so, would not the production of spring 
wheat be also affected ? In fact we must not look 
exclusively to chemical causes for an answer to the 
question. The soil is for the most part light loam, 
friable, often abounding in vegetable matter, and 
very retentive of moisture. The subsoil generally 
approaches the surface, and is composed of sand, 
pebbles, and clay, forming an exceedingly compact 
mass, or hardpan, scarcely to be broken at all by 
the common plow, and through which water cannot 
penetrate, except in small quantities. The rain is 
therefore retained on the surface. The upper soil 
acts as a*sponge, and under the influence of frost, 
becomes mixed with ice so as to bear a resemblance 
to a honey-comb. Hence, as soon as the fibrous 
roots of the trees (which, while they remain, pre¬ 
vent heaving) have decayed, winter wheat is actu¬ 
ally lifted out. 
What may be the effect of the subsoil plow by 
producing mixture of the hardpan with the upper 
soil we shall hereafter state from the result of »*:- 
perience. It is a common idea that the hardpan 
contains lime, and would thus correct the supposed 
deficiency in the upper soil. Some specimens hav¬ 
ing been subjected to severe chemical tests, with a 
view to giving the result, it was found that they 
yielded scarcely a trace of lime. Yet as the deeper 
hardpan is not so impervious to water as that near 
the surface, and as it crumbles upon exposure to the 
air, there is room to hope that its effects would be 
highly beneficial; and particularly so to the growth 
of winter wheat. 
Spring wheat nowhere yields better grain or in 
greater abundance. Nor is it easy to find any 
region where, with the same amount of cultivation, 
can be raised better crops of barley, oats, flax, 
buckwheat, beans, turnips, carrots, parsnips, and 
potatoes; while as to grass and clover it is pro¬ 
bably excelled by no portion of the Union. Two 
tons of hay to the acre are far from being an un¬ 
usual crop; it is the quantity commonly obtained 
from land well seeded down and occasionally ma¬ 
nured. The quality of the hay is excellent. The 
same retention of moisture which prevents the 
growth of winter wheat is admirably favorable to 
grass. It is long before a summer drought is felt, 
and the grass, suffering little from this cause, grows 
luxuriantly in the fall, and sprouts up in the spring 
as early as in any part of the State. 
From causes already mentioned, the price of this 
land has greatly decreased. Discouraged by the 
bad success of bad farming, many are anxious to 
sell at low prices. There are instances where 
half-cleared farms have been sold for $4 to $5 per 
acre, and good grazing farms, with the common 
buildings of the country, can very easily be bought 
for $8 per acre, even within twenty or thirty miles 
of Buffalo. Assuming the average price of wheat 
land in this State to be about $40 per acre, five 
acres of the former can be bought for one acre of 
wheat land. If four sheep can be kept on one acre 
of the grass land of this region (and most farmers 
say this is below the average capability), it is easy 
for any practical farmer to determine how the profit 
from twenty good sheep, after deducting the neces¬ 
sary expense, compares with the profit, after similar 
deduction, from the average annual produce of one 
acre of wheat land. 
As neat cattle thrive here, it is found that the 
butter and cheese of this district, when properly 
made, cannot be surpassed. Access to railroads. 
Lake Erie, and the canals, renders transportation to 
the seaboard cheap, safe, and rapid, whilst the con¬ 
sumption of provisions in the cities of Rochester 
and Buffalo furnishes a ready market for any sur¬ 
plus of such productions as are of a perishable 
nature, or too bulky for distant transportation. 
Probably no great length of time will elapse, before 
well-fed beef, mutton, and pork, will be sent hence 
to Albany, Boston, and New York, and a larger 
