The Iola register. [volume] (Iola, Allen County, Kansas) 1875-1902, 1885-04-03
RrNovAIlNu PAsIUHEs.
Tie Imp ortanoe Of Keeping Up the Fer.
tility Of the Soil.

they have been pastured and have re-
ceiTed no dressing except the droppings
Of the animals which have run upon
them. Such limited fertilization IS not
enough to keep up the fertility Of the
soil, although some farmers seem to
think it is sufficient. Sometimes we
hear farmers say that they keep cows
and sell the milk, so as to maintain the
fertility of the farm. If they kept
sheep in their pastures they would lie
able to keep up the fertility and even
increase it, but keeping cows and selling
The milk does not do it. The milk Of
an ordinary COW, in one summer, will
contain about forty pounds of bone
material. Ten cows would remove
from a pasture, during one season,
about 400 pounds of bone substance,
besides the potash and nitrogen which
would be carried off. In fifty years, ten
cows would thus remove 10000 pounds
or ten tons of bone material from the
pasture. The application of ten tons of
bone flour to that pasture would
undoubtedly do much to restore its
fertility, and the application of enough
would still further improve it. If a
man kept cows in pasture, made
butter. fed the milk to calves and pigs,
saved all manure made by the cows,
calves and pigs during the summer,
and applied it to the pasture, the fertil-
ity of the soil would be well maintained,
because nearly all that was taken from
it would be returned The butter, be-
inc hydrocarbon, would cause no ex-
haustion to the soil.
Many of the old pastures have been
overstocked for years, and the grasses
have been literally starved out and
grown thin of necessity. while MOSES,
weeds and bushes have come in to take
their places. Some of this land is not
worth trying to renovate. If the bushes
and small trees which spring up in
some of them are such as are likely to be
of any value. they should be allowed to
grow and cover the land with forest
growth. There are many old pas
lures which would be worth more if
covered with forest trees than they are
for any other purpose. Some of the
turnout" pastures can be renovated
by narrowing, re-seeding and top
dressing. Barn manure is excellent for
this purpose; wood ashes prove very
beneficial to grass lands. Ashes
contain in abundance the salts that
grasses require for their growth. Mr..
Charles l.. Flint, in his work on
''Grasses and Forage Plants,'' says:
Grasses are often more benefited by
ashes than other crops, since they re-
quire greater amount of the salts
which ashes contain" According to
Prof. Liebig, with every one hundred
and ten pounds of leached ashes upon
the soil, we furnish as much phosphate
as five hundred and seven pounds of
the richest manure could yield. In re-
gard to the use of leached ashes, Mr..
Flint says: Careful experiments by
practical, conservative men show that
land producing one ton to the acre has
been improved by this means so as to
yield three tons to the acre. Where
thirty bushels were used on three
fourths of an acre. in one instance, the
crop was increased more than three
fold" Ii ashes, leached or unleached,
can be obtained, there is nothing better
for applying to pastures to increase the
grass crop. If the pasture soil is light,
sandy or gravelly, meadow mud some
times proves very beneficial. In one
case meadow mud, which had been ex-
posed to the action of frost one winter,
was spread upon light, gravelly soil,
and upon another part of the field barn
manure was spread. The grass upon
the part where the mud was spread was
heavier and looked more luxuriant The
mud not only served as a fertilizer, but
also improved the texture Of the soil
and assisted in retaining moisture.
Some of the pastures, are 50 run out
that it seems necessary to pillow, fer
tilize and reseed. In such cases very
common mistake in seeding down is
made by using only two or three kinds
of seed, such as herdsgrass, clover and
redtop or orchard grass. A greater
variety of seed should be used The
natural sod in good pasture. viii con-
tain as many as fifteen or twenty diff
ferent kinds of grass and forage plants,
all within, perhaps, the same square
yard. The kinds of grasses which
spontaneously spring up in the best old
pastures should be used so. far as OBJ
tainable for seeding pasture land.
Among these grasses are the June or
blue grass, the fowl-meadow glass,
redtop, the wire grass. and there may
be added for seeding also herdsgrass,
orchard grass, red and white clover
and several of the rye grasses. In re-
gard to some of these. grasses, a recent
writer says: THE june, grass is re-
garded as very valuable, throwing out
a dense mass of leaves, highly relished
by cattle, and from which superior
quantity of butter is; made 1t is found
growing throughout the butter dis
tricts of the country. The wire grass
is deemed one of the most nutritive OF
grasses, is very hardy, eagerly sought
after by cattle, and is, one of the best
grasses for fattenings Cows fed upon
it Weld milk of the richest quality,
from which the incest butter is made.
1t fiourishes well upon gravelly knobs
and in shaded places. and its stem is
green after the seed has ripened. 1t is
found growing in all parts of the coun-
Try. The advantages Of sowing large
variety of grasses; IN seeding pasture
land are that a larger quantity of feed
will be produced and = succession OF
grasses throughout the season viii be
secured--Mirror and Farmer.
He APelogized.