Ip 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
[January, 
The Family of the Grasses. 
GEOGRAPHICAL DISTRIBUTION OE GRAINS. 
If any thing on earth exhibits the ineffable 
wisdom and beneficence of the Creator, it cer¬ 
tainly is this family of plants. No other family 
comprises so many genera, species, and individ¬ 
uals, and no others are so extensively distributed 
over the habitable globe. We see that the most 
useful plants are by far the most numerous; and 
the most widely diffused of these are embraced 
in the Grass Family, ( Graminem.) The most 
useful species of this family are: Wheat, Rye , Bar¬ 
ley , Rice, Maize , or Indian Corn, Oats, Sugar- Cane, 
Sorghum , and Imphee. From these plants, as is 
well known, our bread and sugar are mainly de¬ 
rived. To these genera and species may be 
added those kinds of grasses on which the whole 
family of ruminant animals principally subsist, 
viz: Timothy-grass ( plileum pratense ,) Blue- 
grass {poa compressa,) Bed-top ( agrostis vulgaris ,) 
Panic-grass ( panicum nitidwm,) Millet ( milium ef- 
fusum,) Fescue-grass ( festuca pratensis and elatior ,) 
Broom-grass ( bromus pubescens ,) Beard-grass (an- 
dropogon nutans,) and numerous other varieties 
of the genera above named, as well as many 
other genera. The plants are herbaceous, with 
few exceptions, as the Bamboo, which has the 
hardness of wood. Botanists have enumerated 
more than 300 species of the grasses in the 
United States, notwithstanding which, those va¬ 
rieties commonly cultivated here for fodder, are 
of European origin. 
Within the northern polar circle, agriculture 
is found only in a few places. In Siberia grain 
reaches at the utmost only to 60°, in the eastern 
parts scarcely to 55°, and in Kamschatka there 
is no agriculture even in the southern parts 
about 51°. The polar limit of agriculture on 
the northwest coast of America appears to be 
somewhat higher; for, in the more southern 
Russian possessions, (57° to 58°,) barley and rye 
come to maturity. On the east coast of Ameri¬ 
ca it is scarcely above 50° to 52°. Only in Eu¬ 
rope, namely, in Lapland, does the polar limit 
reach an unusually high latitude, (70°.) Beyond 
this, dried fish, and here and there a few pota¬ 
toes supply the place of grain. The grains 
which extend farthest to the north, in Europe, 
are barley and oats. These, which in milder 
climates are not used for bread, afford to the in¬ 
habitants of Norway and Sweden, of a part of 
Siberia and Scotland, their chief vegetable 
nourishment. Rye and spelt are the next which 
become associated with these. Rye is the pre¬ 
vailing grain in a great part of the North Tem¬ 
perate zone, namely, in the south of Sweden, 
and Norway, Denmark, and in all the lands 
bordering on the Baltic, the north of Germany, 
part of northern Russia in Europe, and part of 
Siberia. In the latter, another very nutritious 
grain, buckwheat, ( polygonum fagopyrum) is fre¬ 
quently cultivated. In the zone where rye pre¬ 
vails, wheat is also generally to be found; bar¬ 
ley being here chiefly cultivated for beer, and 
oats supplying food for horses. To these there 
follows a zone in Europe and western Asia, 
where rye disappears and wheat almost exclu¬ 
sively furnishes bread. The middle or the south 
of France, England, part of Scotland, a part of 
Germany, Hungary, the Crimea and Caucasus, 
as also the middle lands of Asia, where agricul¬ 
ture is followed, belong to this zone. Here the 
vine is also found; wine supplants the use of 
beer, and barley is consequently less raised. 
Next comes a district where wheat still 
abounds, but no longer exclusively furnishes 
bread; rice and maize, or Indian corn, becom¬ 
ing frequent. To this zone belong Portugal, 
Spain, part of France on the Mediterranean, 
Italy, and Greece; also the countries of the 
East: Persia, Northern India, Arabia, Egypt, 
Nubia, Barbary, and the Canary Islands; in 
these latter countries, however, the culture of 
Indian coni or rice towards the south, is always 
more considerable, and in some of them, several 
kinds of sorghum ( Doura), and Poa Abyssinica, 
come to be added. In both these regions of 
wheat, rye only occurs at considerable eleva¬ 
tions ; oats, however, more seldom, and they at 
last entirely disappear; barley affording food 
for horses and mules. 
In the eastern parts of the temperate zone of 
the Old Continent, in China and Japan,, our 
northern kinds of grain are very unfrequent, 
and rice is found to predominate. The cause 
of this difference between the east and the west 
of the Qld. Continent, appears to be in the man¬ 
ners and peculiarities of the people. In North 
America, wheat and rye grow as in Europe, but 
more sparingly. Indian corn is more raised in 
the Western than in the Old Continent, and rice 
which is cultivated to considerable extent in 
South Carolina, Georgia, and in the Gulf States. 
In the torrid zone, Indian corn predominates 
in America, rice in Asia, and both these grains 
in nearly equal quantity in Africa. The cause 
of this distribution is, perhaps, historical; for 
Asia is the native country of rice, and Indian 
corn is indigenous to America, and probably al¬ 
so to Africa and Asia. It is true that most wri¬ 
ters who have mentioned this plant have main¬ 
tained that America is its native region; but no 
botanist has ever found it here growing wild ; 
but the Landers found it extensively cultivated 
all along the river Niger in Africa 500 to 1500 
miles from the ocean. p, 
Hudson, Ohio. 
For the American Agriculturist. 
Benefits of Rotation. 
A correspondent of the Country Gentleman 
from Wisconsin thinks rotation is unnecessary, 
from the fact that he has raised potatoes with 
improving crops each year, for four years suc¬ 
cessively. This is one of the cases where “ a 
little learning is a dangerous thing.” There is 
no principle better established in modern hus¬ 
bandry, than the necessity of rotation to secure 
maximum crops. The eminent success of British 
farming rests upon this practice. It is quite 
possible that in a virgin soil, the same crop may 
be grown with success for years in succession. 
But this does not invalidate the principle. Cul¬ 
tivation soon uses up a virgin soil (except in bot¬ 
tom lands,) and nothing but rotation can keep 
up their fertility during a long period of time. 
On a piece of reclaimed land where we got 220 
bushels of field beets in 1860, we this year gath¬ 
ered only 127 bushels. The land had manure 
enough and careful tillage. The result we have 
no doubt was mainly owing to a repetition of 
the same crop. On a piece of garden soil where 
we gathered thirty eight bushels of carrots in 
1860,we raised this year less than twenty bushels. 
The soil was rich with manure, but had been in 
carrots four years. On another patch where 
potatoes had been grown with carrots as a suc¬ 
cession crop, for only two years, there was less 
than half a crop. On another piece of meadow 
that had been p in grass for a generation, pota¬ 
toes were planted five years in succession. They 
did very well for three years. The yield the 
last season was not more than half a crop, 
though manured broadcast and in the hill. 
These facts show pretty conclusively that the 
soil demands a rotation. It may be doubted 
whether the exception, usually made in favor 
of the onion crop, disproves the rule. It is well 
known that wood ashes are a favorite fertilizer for 
this crop, and that the lime and potash in them 
are alkalies, and prepare plant food very rapid¬ 
ly for the use of the crop. But even with this 
aid, the maggot and other diseases are making 
their appearance in the onion districts, and very 
much diminishing the profits. May not the 
trouble be owing in part to the practice of com¬ 
pelling the onion to live upon its own decay, 
as it must where the same land is used for this 
crop for a long course of years. 
In virgin soils, or those that have lain in grass 
for a long period, it may be economical to re¬ 
peat a crop, but as a rule there should be a 
change of crops every year. Whatever may be 
the philosophy of the fact, it will hardly be dis¬ 
puted that all crops do better in rotation. 
Plants seem as fond of a change of food as ani¬ 
mals. Connecticut. 
An Englishman on Peat. 
In a recent number of a leading British maga¬ 
zine, the Editor grows eloquent over his “new¬ 
ly discovered” uses of peat. He speaks of 
what the majority ot American farmers have 
long known, as follows:—“ Dry peat lias been 
discovered by an eminent agricultural professor 
of chemistry as a good deodorizer of offensive 
putrid substances; it possesses the wonder¬ 
ful disinfecting properties of charcoal; and by 
mixing with common night soil in about equal 
proportions, makes a valuable manure, not in¬ 
ferior in its results to the best South American 
Guano.” He says that when thus prepared, it 
may be used as a top-dressing, or be drilled, or 
dropped in with seed, at the rate of 700 to 800 
pounds per acre, and may he used for every 
known crop, for the garden and for the lawn. 
Pulverize peat and strew it over the floors of 
stables, piggeries, or cow-houses, with a thin 
covering of straw over it, to keep the animals 
clean, and it will disinfect the buildings and ab¬ 
sorb all the liquids which would otherwise waste. 
Wherever there is a small nuisance of any 
kind, a cess-pool, sewer, water-closet, vexatious 
kitchen drain, etc., treat the same with peat. 
Let eveiy cottager possess himself of a barrel or 
two of this article, and his little domain will 
thrive like a green bay-tree. “ From the palace 
to the hovel, let this grand renovator and puri 
tier be,” etc., etc. Our trans-Atlantic cotempo¬ 
rary goes on in a very grandiloquent style. 
Fence for Wet Lands. 
To the Editor of the American Agriculturist. 
The best fence which I know of for land that 
“heaves,” is made in panels four boards high, 
the boards nailed with twelve-penny clinch nails, 
to three strips of white pine plank (1| or li 
inches thick. The panels are held up against the 
posts by binding with number 8 annealed wire. 
No middle post is required. If hemlock boards 
are used, a brace and bit are necessary to bore 
through the boards at the ends, to prevent split¬ 
ting. The posts being sharpened when set, 
they can be driven back if they heave, without 
injury to the fence. The above is from an ex¬ 
perience of nine yeai'3 with different kinds of 
panel fence. It is easily and quickly made, is 
cheap, not patented, and is the best portable 
fence I have ever seen, if I did invent it myself. 
I have also tried all sorts of ways for nailing 
