The Bolivar bulletin. [volume] (Bolivar, Hardeman County, Tenn.) 1865-1888, 1884-09-04
Lands for Grass.

Clay or heavy loan lands are L at
| suitable for grass, and one well seeded
will improve and thicken up and bear
heavier crops for many years, and can
be kept in permanent grass providing
they are properly MANFRED, for you can
not take off for successive years the
grass without returning manure in some
form to keep up tie fertility of the soil
I ct how much moving land do we see
reverting to pastures or plowed up
cultivated to potatoes and then corn, or
to corn and then potatoes, and then re-
seeded to grass at great cost for seed
and labor to keep it in grass from three
to five years, and then plowed again to
go through the same round of opera
lions at much expense and compare
lively little return for the labor and
money for seed expended. Unless the
land was improperly laid down, and is
too uneven to use the moving ma
chine, tedder and horse-rake, it should
not be plOwed, but kept in grass by
tOp-dressing, and for this purpose arti-
fetal manures are better than composts
or barn manures, for the reason that
they viii produce more for the same
money, and there is less expense in
their application. If compost or barn
manure is used, it must be worked over
and made fine; for, to use coarse ma
nure on moving land, would result in
reconveying to the barn with the hay
much that would not be decOmposed
the first season, and would impair the
quality of the hay. Where lands are
light, grass can not be retained in the
soil that length of time; it can not be
retained in heavier soils unless they are
naturally moist or can be irrigated.
If present moving land is too uneven
to work to advantage the present hay
ing implements, or for other reasons it
is DESTROYS to break it up and cultivate
1t and then reseed it, in either case the
ground should be well cultivated and
put in cOnd ton by being literally man.
urcd, and liberal manuring need not
cost over five dollars per acre; for two
tons hay will take from the soil only
seventeen pounds phosphoric acid and
siXty-nine pounds potash in mineral
elements to be supplied, supposing that
neither of these was added to the crop
from that already existing in the soil
Land can be seeded to grass to adj
vantage in March, April, May, or, if
more convenient, in August, Septem-
Der, or October; in any case, however
the ground should be well titled, made
fine, to have good seed-bed, and we'll
MANFRED to give the grass the oppor-
tunity to overcome the weeds. If the
land is not well titled and MANFRED the
weeds will overcome the grass, and this
is more likely to be the case where the
land has been deeply plowed and land
turned up which has not been exposed
for n length of time to the beneficial
action of the atmosphere to keep up its
store of available nutritive matter. By
the slowly insolubIe silicates
slowly yield alkalies, lime and mag
nesia in soluble forms; the sulphides
are converted into sulphates; and, gen
orally, the minerals of the soil are dis
and mixed with the influence
of the oxygen, the water, the carbonic
acid, and the nitric acid of the air.
Again, the atmospheric nitrogen is as
simiIable by the soil in the shape of am
nitrates and the amide-like mat. |
ters of humus.
The rate of disinteoration, rs well as |
that of nitrifcation, depends in part
upon the chemical and physical char |
acterS of the soil, and partly upon the |
temperature and neurological condi- |
tons.
Grass, on some accounts, is one of |
the best crops 10 raise, as it is always /
in demand, brings remunerative price |
in the market, and requires very little /
labor, and uses horse power principally. |
The use of labOr-saving machinery in /
laying enables the farmer to gather his /
harvest in better season than formerly,
md experience shows that the best time /
Tor cutting is when the grass is in bios
'om, rs it then contains the highest per-
sentage of soluble matters, and early
cutting gives the second crop time to
grow. 1t can not be called good grass
and or well MANFRED that viii not pro-
luce two good crops in a season.
Grass allowed to grow to seed before
'eing cut eXhausts the land to a much
greater extent than when cut in bios
ON, as it is in perfecting its seed that
he crop makes its greatest draft on
he soil, and by the time the seed is
ormed the succulent nature of the grass
las changed, and its soluble matters,
ugar, gum and starch. have been grad
ALLY transformed into woody fiber, in
which state it does not possess the nu-
ritive qualities that it does when cut in
blossom, and is consequently of much
ess value to feed the stock.
Light lands and those not adapted to
rass are better to cultivate in corn,
nd by the system of ensilage, corn
makes a good substitute for hay if fed
nth grain, and with hay and ensiIage
here is no reason why the dairy inter
st should not thrive and our stock of
attic and sheep should not increase
luch faster in the future than they
ave N the past Boston Globe,