172 
June. 
THE CUL 
1. Our permanent grass lands, are in large part lo¬ 
cated on those portions of the farm unfitted for tillage 
-rough or swampy—full of low places, too wet for any 
cultivated grasses to thrive there. Or it is cold, springy 
land—or that with retentive subsoil—always full of 
stagnant water except in very dry seasons, and then 
baked and hard. Such soils are in grass because they 
will produce nothing else without improvement, and the 
quantity and character of the herbage show that the 
present product is of very little value. 
Drainage is the first thing needed. We must get rid 
of all standing water as soon after it falls as may be. 
However well such land may be seeded in the first 
place, if water remains on the surface late in spring, 
the cultivated grasses soon give way to coarser and 
nearly worthless herbage, or linger with a sickly and 
stunted growth of very little value for feeding purpo¬ 
ses. 
A well-drained soil is as much better for growing 
grass, as it is for any other crop. Ten to one that it is 
the first step to be taken for the improvement of grass 
land. Let us get rid of all surface water at any rate 
—we shall soon see where there is need of more tho¬ 
rough work. 
2. More attention to seeding would go'far in the im¬ 
provement of grass land. Nature does much, but man 
can assist and direct her operations. Many a meadow 
and pasture is self-stocked—it may be to grass, but 
more likely many weeds claim their right to a foothold 
there. Had grass seed—and enough of it—been sown, 
it would have left no room for weeds, especially if the 
land had received proper culture and preparation. 
There is no economy in stinting grass seed—unless we 
call it economy to save a dollar here and lose ten in the 
future crop. 
In seeding we may improve our grass land by suiting 
variety to the soil and the end desired. There are 
many kinds of grasses in their prime for different por¬ 
tions of the season ; by a due mixture of these we may 
have fresh, green pastures from early spring until the 
close of autumn. 
3. Cultivation and manure would work wonders in 
the improvement of the grass crop of the country—a 
rich deep soil, and such alone can produce a large 
growth of hay or pasture. That preparation of the land 
which gives the best grain and root crops, will give the 
greatest grass crop, or will best pi-epare the land there¬ 
for. On a rich, deep and porous soil, drought has very 
little effect—on a poor, shallow and hard one, the grass 
or other crop always suffers severely from any lack of 
rain. 
Land lying long in grass needs repeated dressings of 
manure. There is no occasion for plowing up our grass 
lands half as frequently, if we would only give them 
some fertilizer, like composted barn manure, ashes, 
plaster, bone dust, guano, &c , every two or three years 
We have spoken mainly of the general improve¬ 
ments wanted, and may now leave the subject for a 
while to the consideration of our readers. Will they 
give us their practical experience bearing upon the 
question before us—one of the most important in the 
whole round of productive farming. 
-e 9 o- 
The writer who uses weak arguments and strong 
epithets, makes quite as great a mistake as the land¬ 
lady who furnishes her guests with weak tea and strong 
butter. 
TIVATOR 
A Tidy Door-Yard and a Productive Garden. 
Messrs. Editors —How many of your readers have 
ever testified their gratitude to you and to Mr. Edger- 
ton, for that excellent article which appeared in the 
Cultivator for February, 1855, under the heading, 
“ How to Enrich a Garden.” Probably but few have 
given expression to their gratitude or their sense of its 
value, but many, I doubt not, have felt grateful, and 
would willingly acknowledge their appreciation of its 
value and utility. I am inclined to think this highly 
probable in consequence of having found one of the 
readers of your monthly for that year, exceedingly en¬ 
thusiastic in the oral expression of his great indebted¬ 
ness to that article for information and hints which 
have been of much value to him during the three sea¬ 
sons since. 
After a trial of the method reported in that article 
for some time, he introduced a few improvements or 
modifications as circumstances suggested them, and 
these he would like to have submitted to your readers, 
as he thinks they may be useful to some by aiding them 
to contrive some plan, whereby they may at once save 
their slops from being wasted, keep their door-yards 
tidy and free from disagreeable smells, and have an 
abundant supply of material for enriching their gar¬ 
dens, orchards, or other lands. 
At first this follower of Mr. Edgerton’s hints and 
methods, adopted the same kind of receptacle for the 
slops of the house, as that mentioned in the article re¬ 
ferred to, namely, a half-hogshead set convenient to 
the kitchen and wood-shed. He soon found, however, 
that there were two inconveniences about this arrange¬ 
ment ; the first of which was, that it was not always 
convenient to empty it every night, sometimes from 
the ground being wet enough from rains, and sometimes 
from weariness or other causes. The other inconve¬ 
nience consisted in the disagreeable stench arising from 
the tub in warm weather. In order to prevent these 
inconveniences, he adopted the plan of setting an oil- 
cask down into the ground, on the north side of the 
buildings, which situation, together with a cover, pre¬ 
vented the contents from heating, fermenting, and 
emitting bad smells for two or more days at a time, 
even in the hottest weather. Finding that all the slops, 
suds, &c., of the house could not be readily disposed of 
upon the garden, and convinced that they were too 
valuable to be thrown away and wasted, besides dis¬ 
figuring the door-yard and causing some bad smell 
whenever thrown out on the surface, he now rakes up 
all the chips and dirt of the yard into a heap, conve¬ 
nient to the back door of the kitchen, adding several 
loads of dry muck, and has all the slops not needed for 
the garden, carried up to the hollowed out center of 
this pile, and there emptied. By this means he avoids 
all waste and all bad smells, and keeps his door-yard 
quite neat and tidy, and at the end of the warm sea¬ 
son he has several loads of manurial matter, probably 
not greatly inferior to some guanos. 
Like Mr. Edgerton, this gentleman takes the evening 
as the most appropriate season for distributing over the 
garden the contents of the cask, using a large watering 
can with a nose in preference to a pail and dipper. In 
warm weather, after repeated distributions of this li¬ 
quid manure, he has found occ ( asionally a disagreeable 
smell arising from the earth ; but this, he says, is easily 
prevented or got rid of by hoeing or otherwise breaking 
