The Daily state journal. [volume] (Alexandria, Va.) 1868-1874, 1872-09-09
Gre,sittg State Sn,lsaat.
MONDAY EvEG. SEPT. 8, 1872
Iron the American Agriculturist ]
Walks and Talks on the FIRM.


as when dry. The Deacon came up to con-
graduate me. He is one Of the cautious
kind, and only cuts down few acres at
time, and then stops the machine until he
has got it all i'll. The result is he is not yet
through having, and what he has got in is
in no better condition than mine. "But
you have large force" he says, while in
point of fact | have no more men in pro-
portion to the amount Of hay than the Dea-
con has. In fact not so many. The only
reason VIII am ahead of the Deacon is
because | regarded not the clouds. Nv
theory is that so long as the grass is green
rain does not hurt it. But whenever it is
partially cured, then rain or dew is very
injurious. If because it rains to-day it is
less likely to rain tomorrow, it is better to
cut in the rain, and get everything ready to
put all hands to curing and getting in the
hay to-morrow-or at any rate to get it into
cock.
A tedding-machine is grand implement
for meadow or timothy hay, and may also
be used to great advantage in field of
early-cut clover that is full of sap. We
have the best climate in the world for cur
ing hay, and our implements are about as
nearly perfect as we can hope to get them.
1t is difficult to see how our mowers can
be improved, unless it is in hardening and
strengthening the parts most liable to wear
out and break. My land is pretty rough
and stony, but we did not break or injure a
single thing about the machines this season.
When Think Of how much trouble we had
with our old machine eight or ten years ago,
have gratifying realization of the great
improvements that have been gradually
effected. What we want to do now is to
grow larger and better crops of hay.
have Just read with much interest pa
per in the last Journal Of the Royal Agri-
cultural Society of England on the manage
ment of grass land, by Ii. S. Thompson, of
Kirby Hall, Yorkshire. | do not know
that it presents anything especially new,
but as ] grow Older new things have less
attraction for me. like to see old truths
presented in a new light, and illustrated
and enforced by practical experience. L
never get tired of reading about wet farm
that has been drained, or q foul farm that
has been cleaned, or a rundown farm that
has been brought to high state of fertility.
Such accounts are always interesting and
always useful. They encourage us, to 90
ahead with our own farm improvements.
We need line upon line and example after
example. Weneed to have our faith In good
farming strengthened. 1t does one great
deal OF good to get a splendid crop, or even to
hear Of others getting it by the same pro-
cesscs that we are adopting. When puta
five-inch-pipe drain through the old swale i'll
the corner adjoining the Deacon's West
line, where we used to have foot of water
in June, felt sure that it would knock
the bottom out " of the pond and give me
good land, but it was none the less pleasant
to see the water soak rapidly away, and
the dry land appear early in the spring.
And now when | stand by the fence that
divides the two fields, and see forty bushels
Of Diehl wheat per acre on the old swale on
The enc side of the fence, and crop that
will not yield eight bushels on the other, |
know there is nothing new in all this,
but it is none the less encouraging and
gratifying for all that. 1t is a result which
all experience and observation would lead
one to expect, but it is very pleasant and
profitable to see it with ones own eyes.
There is one phrase i'll Mr.. Thompson's
essay that is new to me. When speaking
Of top-dressing grass land with barn-yaId
or artificial manures, he calls them ''tilage"
or "tillages." "All tillage," he says,
SHOULD be applied to strong land pastures
early in winter" y eli
the application of tillage be delayed until
March or April, and droughty spring
follows, the application loses great part Of
its effect for that season." like this use
of the word. 1t is very significant. 1t is n
recognition of the fact that tillage is manure,
and manure is tillage. In other words,
that blowing and working the land is, in a
certain sense, equivalent to manuring il,
and on the Other hand that manuring the
land is equivalent to working it.
In England, summer-iallowing as a means
Of enriching land has been pretty well
abandoned. Land is high, and meat in
great demand, and it pays better to keep
large amount of stock, and buy American
oil-cake, cotton-seed cake, and corn to feed
out, and. make great quantity Of rich
manure, than to adopt the slow method of
enriching the land by following. They
have also another advantage over us.
They can buy artificial manures at some
thing like what they are worth. The time
will come when we can do so here, and
then we shall use them in enormous guam
titles. Mr.. Thompson's tayoritc 8 tillage"
for grass land is l cwt. OF nitrate Of soda,
cwt. mineral superphosphate, and 3 cwt.
kainit ner acre. These manures cost
about $40 per acre. For moving land, he
would increase the quantity oil nitrate to
II cwt. per acre.
Almost all English writers who have WIS.,
tied this country seem to be struck with
the poor, brown, weedy, burnt-up look Of
our pastures. | have always believed that
we can raise just as good grass here as in
England. Who can doubt that we could if
we should top-dress field of pasture land
with ten or fifteen tons of well rotted barn
yard manure per acre, and then feed off the
grass to sheep witch are allowed one pound
of oil-cake each per day? Then late in the
fall sow $40 worth Of artificial manures per
acre. The next fall top-dress again with
barn-yard manure, and the next year re-
peat the artificial manures, and in the mean
time feed off the grass with sheep eating
cake or grain. Ii we took pains to NOV
down the weeds and coarse fluffy grass,
and narrowed and sowed little grass seed
occasionally, can any one DOUBT that we
should have just as good pasture as they
have in England? | believe we should
have better. Whether it would pay or not
is question have not now time to answer.
But believe there are thousands of farms
ON which some such a system would prove
worry profitable.
The great defect with our permanent