Vol. LXVI. No. 2978 
NEW YORK, FEBRUARY 23, 1907 
WEEKLY. $1.00 PER YEAR 
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NEW LIFE TO OLD CRASS 
LANDS. 
Fine Crops; Rough Seeding. 
Last Spring I sent you some 
photographs illustrating the 
work accomplished on rough 
pasture lands by N. N. Dummer, 
of Rowley, Mass. I now send 
pictures of the results of that 
work, Figs. 56 and 63, and some 
showing the manner in which 
the land was worked. As l 
said at the time, the land in 
question is of varied description 
and conformation, all of it 
rough, bushy and with many 
stones and trees, and at first 
glance hardly worth reclaiming 
on account of the great labor it 
would to all appearances involve. 
The method adopted by Mr. 
Dummer is rather .unusual,' and 
in these days of intensive culti¬ 
vation, it might with some pro¬ 
priety be called “pioneer farm¬ 
ing.’’ It is certainly the very 
antithesis to Mr. Clark’s method 
of thorough culture and com¬ 
plete subjugation of the soil be¬ 
fore seeding, and, of course, re¬ 
sults such as are obtained by Mr. 
Clark are not claimed for this 
manner of handling the land. 
What the latter aims at doing 
and hastens by all possible 
means (i. e., a rapid transform¬ 
ation of all vegetation into plant 
food, and the production of a 
deep ‘mellow seed bed), is here 
allowed to be performed by Na¬ 
ture, at her leisure, while crops 
of grass are growing. 
After the land has been 
cleared of trees, bushes and of 
all visible stones, the plowing is 
begun with the ordinary drag 
plow. This year a little more 
than 21 acres were reclaimed 
and the plowing was awarded 
by contract to three different 
parties, and as is shown in the 
pictures, each undertook the 
work in his own manner. The 
requirements were to plow deep¬ 
ly enough to bury the bulk of 
the roots, the same time turn¬ 
ing up an inch or two of the 
dirt that lay below them, in or¬ 
der to afford some sort of seed 
bed. This, however, was not al¬ 
ways possible, and after plowing, 
a great part of the land looked 
rough and uneven, the furrows 
being half turned and a perfect 
mat of small roots with, to be 
sure, some soil between them. 
Men were set behind the plows 
removing all loose roots and 
trash, pulling the remaining 
stumps, then the harrows were 
started, double and single-ac¬ 
tion Cutaways, common and 
plain disk harrows, bush and 
bog plows, all that could be 
mustered were put to work. 
Roots and trash, continually 
loosened by the harrows, was 
ANOTHER WAY OF BREAKING THE GROUND. Etc. 55. 
l 
THE FOUNDATION FOR A NEW ENGLAND MEADOW. Fig. 56. 
ONE WAY OF PLOWING THE OLD FIELD. Fig. 57. 
piled up and burned, and a few 
harrowings leveled the ground a 
good deal, reducing greatly the 
sod, or rather the mat of roots; 
still at seeding time things did 
not look very promising, and on 
the very morning when the seed¬ 
ing was begun, it seemed to the 
uninitiated, that with another 
year or two of such work the land 
might be worried into submis¬ 
sion, but under no circumstances 
would a farmer have ventured 
to entrust seed to such a seed 
bed. But Mr. Dummer had done 
so before, and this is the very 
point of his contention that pro¬ 
fitable crops of hay can be 
grown on land thus treated, 
while the final subduing of the 
soil and the reduction . of all 
these roots into humus and plant 
food is left to time and its vari¬ 
ous solvent agents. According 
to the land and kind of vegeta¬ 
tion the plow cannot always 
reach below the roots and bury 
them out of sight. One has 
then to trust in the soil between 
the up-turned roots as affording 
enough of a hold for the seed 
to start. The growing crop of 
grass will then stifle all attempts 
of those roots to throw out 
leaves and new growth. 
Toward the end of August, 
S00 pounds of a special seeding- 
down manure were evenly spread 
with two Empire broadcasters, 
which did the work well; this 
was harrowed in thoroughly and 
the seed sown with a wheelbar¬ 
row seeder. 
On land prepared in this man¬ 
ner and well top-dressed with 
manure and fertilizer, a crop of 
over zy 2 tons of hay was har¬ 
vested, plus a good crop of 
rowen. This is a far better 
yield than is usually obtained in 
this section. In order to accom¬ 
modate his increasing crop of 
hay, Mr. Dummer has designed 
a 16-sided barn. A barn of this 
shape, besides being easier and 
cheaper to build, is thought to be 
more convenient for storing hay 
than the ordinary style of barn. 
There will be a cupola over th 
center in which a windlass is to 
be placed for hoisting up the 
hay; it will be driven by a bevel 
gear with shaft extending to the 
floor, with another be\ 'el 'gear 
connected to a gasoline engine 
by a friction pulley. This will 
do away with a track, as in 
other barns, the traveling ov r 
which consumes so much time 
when unloading, for a trap door, 
through which the hay is to he 
hoisted will be used as a chute 
to slide the hay on to which¬ 
ever bay one may desire. Mr. 
Dummer would like the advice 
of readers having had expei i- 
ence in building such a barn. 
H. J. 
