The Middlebury register and Addison County journal. [volume] (Middlebury, Vt.) 1883-1885, 1884-05-30
FARM, GARDEN AND HOUSEHOLD
Seeding TO Grass.

IL HIS DtGu C1lOuBuJ t1dJ our Climate Is
unfavorable to grass. This idea has pre-
vailed so long that it has come to be a
FIRMLY established belief. But like some
other popular beliefs it is utterly baseless.
The truth is we have never tried to grow
grass We have some timothy and clover
as hay crop, but so far as seeding down
meadow with grasses, it has not been
done, excepting by nature, and by few
farmers who have learned lesson from
observing natural effects. The American
climate is especially favorable to grass.
If we want proof let us first look at our
roadsides, where, as we have personally
found, any observer may find a dozen
varieties growing permanently, in spite
of every unfavorable circumstance, as
want of fertility, dry weather, trampling,
and weeds. In West Virginia, Ohio, In
diana, Kentucky, and Missouri we may
find natural meadows of blue grass, which
equal the noted English permanent grass
lands, and which are now a century old
and as yet show no signs of failure.
Further West the boundlcss prairie has
been covered with perennial verdure,
and still further millions of cattle range
over vast pastures, which have borne
grasses of the most nutritious kinds for
no one knows how many centuries or
tens of centuries. Interspersed among
the mountains beyond the plains are
seas of verdure in the picturesque parks
and smaller valleys equally ancient, and
which have been green since the ancient
days when the soil was first formed, for
the cooled rocks which came from the
bowels of the EARTH vomited amid fire
and earthquake. So that it cannot be
the climate, but our want of the neces-
sary skill which prevents us from grow
ing grass upon our fields.
The great trouble in the way is, we do
not choose the right kinds, and we do
not SOW grass. We SOW grain, and put
in grass, and expect a crop of both.
This is against all reason and rule. If
we look at the grass on the roadsides
we may learn lesson that may help u.s.
We shall find several varieties growing
intermingled together, one maturing
early and others later all through the
season. Even at this early period we
may find the first grass to blossom POa
aanua ready to flower if not already
blooming. Then follows sweet vernal
grass, the sweetly odorous breath of thever-
nal spring exhaling from its foliage. Then
come the June grasses, Poa pratcnsis and
Poa compressa, with their early heritage,
and the fescues of several species; several
kinds of agrostis; another useful Poa, the
common fowl meadow grass, Poa scrotina,
and Others following in succession, with
the not to be forgotten white clover
crowding in among them for the place
and living which nature owes it, but
which it will have whether or no. DO we
farmers grow grasses in this way2 On the
contrary, we try precisely the opposite
course, and sow one grass and give that
no kind Of chance
But we are gradually learning better
Some of us have tried the reasonable way
and have met with success. Farmers are
now learning to sow even the common
timothy and clover and treat it as a crop,
that is, to prepare the ground we'll, as if
for crop of grain, and SOW the seed
alone and so thickly that the ground will
be fully occupied. Others are mixing
several kinds, and so precisely following
the example of nature, and the more OF
this that is done the more the example is
followed. We cannot dispense with
grass. 1t is becoming more and more in
dispensable to us every year, and by and
by we shall find the reason why we have
not succeeded earlier has been because
we have been laundering. Mixed grasses,
perfect preparation of the soil, liberal
seeding, and sowing without any robbcl
crop to destroy it. will give us excellent
grass fields. Then we must learn to use
these grass fields well, feed them gener-
ously, and they will be literally respon-
sive.-Ne1o York Times.