Yorkville enquirer. [volume] (Yorkville, S.C.) 1855-2006, 1877-08-09
The farnl and fireside.
THE MEANS GRASS.

Col. D. Wyatt Aiken gives, in the News
and Courier, the following history of this
remarkable variety of grass, in which many of
our readers in this section will be interested
"What is Means Grass, and where can
some be had for experiment on Broad Riv-
err" Thus writes correspondent from Beau
fort.
Botanically, we are unable to say what this
grass is, but we know that wherever. it has
taken hold, it has been considered a curse by
cotton and corn planters. Iti of very vigor'
Gus growth, almost equal to cane has roo o's as
large and as tough aud as numerous as the
cane; is cut down by frost; comes up early in
the spring and looks identically like young
sorghum, and is very like young corn, and
during the summer has as many lives as a
cat. It is almost impossible to get~a stand
of corn or cotton where this grass takes hold,
and when the stand is secured, constant
work is necessary to prevent the crop being
literally smothered by the grass. Almost
any farmer on Broad River, (not Broad
River in Beaufort County, from Shelton's
Ferry to the Congaree, can furnish you with
seed or roots, and, we believe, it grows equal
ly we'll from either. This grass will bear cut
ting three or four times season. We once
heard farmer say he had cut an acre seven
times between the 1st of May and frost, and
thought he had harvested a ton of hay at each
cutting. The hay is coarse, but nutritious,
and if every farmers barn in western Fair
field and Richland had been full of it last
October, it would have sufGced to prevent
much suffering among the cattle and horses
during the past very cold winter.
Where this grass came from originally, is,
perhaps, not definitely settled. A writer in
the Southern Plantation, published in Mont
gomery, Ala, recently said it is called the
"Johnson Grass" in Alabama, because intro
duced there by Col. johnson, of Fairfield
County, in South Carolina, who procured the
seed of DR.. JAS B. Davis, of that comfy, who
had brought it from Constantinople on his
return from that country, where he had been
sent in 1840 Cor thereabouts) by the Cover
nor of South Carolina, at the request of the
Sultan, to teach the bloody Turks how to
grow cotton. They refused to be taught, and
after two consecutive failures, DR.. Davis re-
turned, bringing with him the Brahmin cat.
tie, the Angora Goat (the first importation of
either to the United States) and the seed of
the Means Grass.
In our youthful days we lived in Fairfield
County, and were accustomed to hear diff
ferent version of the origin Of Means grass
We we're told that the Rev. Robt. Means, a
brother of Gov. Means, who was missiona-
ry from the Presbyterian Church to Egypt,
found this grass extensively used as valua.
BILE forage plant on the fertile lands of the
Nile, and conceiving it would he valuable
grass for our country, sent some seed to his
brothers, who propagated it. Either history
establishes the oriental nativity Of tic grass,
and it is little singular that DR.. Davis and
the Rev. Robt. Means both went from Fair.
field County, and from sections only about
five miles apart.
The Means settlement was known as Buck
head, and it was there that this grass was
first known and actually cultivated. A rela-
tive once told US he had cultivated ten acres
of it in thirty-acre field. In three years it
had taken the thirty acres so completely that
nothing else could be grown in the field. He
then cut ditch around the field and it did
not spread for many years, and for ten years
his hogs were kept throughout the year with
in that thirty acres, and never fed except
when penned to be fattened for butchering.
During the summer, his cattle, sheep and hor.
ses were pastured on this thirty.acre field,
and that man was farmer that bough BIT little
else than sugar, coffee, salt and iron.
We have been thus explicit in replying to
this inquiry, that we might not be charged
hereafter with leading any farmer astray.
We have long wanted to experiment with
this grass but have been always deferred by
the universal cry of our farmers that it is a
pest. Whether it is 30 to those who are more
anxious to grow grain and stock than cotton,
we do not know. We have heard of but one
mans attempting to utilize it as a hay crop,
and don't know what was his success.
A late issue of the Charlotte Observer face
tiously describes the grass as follows:
The seed was introduced in this section of
country by the late DR.. Thornwell, of South
Carolina, and it is said that the grass is pc.
culiar to Presbyterian communities. A friend
of ours, than whom nobody bears better
character for truth, says seriously and swears
to it, that it will grow four inches during
night There is good deal oft in the Steel
Creek section of this county, but where it has
not been given away to the farmers, the birds
have carried it about from place to place and
dropped it, and wherever it once starts it is
there for generation. 1t is the best grass in
the world for stock, and they will leave any
thing to eat it. 1t has large, succulent roots,
and hogs are particularly fond of it and tat
ten on it rapidly. Farmers would rather
have it than any other grass, except tor the
fact that it spreads so rapidly and is so ten
acious of life 1t will choke to death any
crop which is sown in field where there are
dozen blades of it.
1t is a matter of fact that two neighbors in
this county having fallen out, one threatened
to SOW the field of the other with Means grass.
The threatened party came post haste to the
city and consulted lawyer as to whether he
could not take steps to Illustrate the designs
of his enraged neig ghbor. He said he did not
want to have personal difficulty with him,
but averred that he would shoot man for
sowing his land in Means grass, as quickly as
he would for burning his house. 1t is an ex-
cellent grass, but is too much like the itch in
a mixed school-it spreads so.
CUTTING T1MBER.-If oak, hickory or
chestnut timber is felled in the eighth month
(August), in the second running of the sap,
and barked, quite large tree will perfectly,
and even the twigs, remain sound for many
years; whereas that cut in winter, and remain
ing until next fall Gas thick as your wrist),
will be completely sap.rotten, and will be al
most unfit for any purpose. The body of the
oak split into rails will not last more than
ten or twelve years. Chestnut will last long
er, but no comparison to those cut in the
Ell ghth month. Hickory cut in the eighth
month is not subject to be worm eaten, and
mill Loot q lonn time for fanninu