The Hawaiian gazette. [volume] (Honolulu [Oahu, Hawaii]) 1865-1918, 1897-12-03
CULTIVATE GRASS
A Much Neglected Fea-
ture of Agriculture.
State of Connecticut Experiment.
ing in Making Good
Lawns.


in the United States. Some of the
experiments made there have attracted
widespread attention, not the least of
which are those in grass growing or
gardening" More than 1900 varieties
Of grass are cultivated at the station
under the direction of Mr.. James B.
Olcot. The grass garden has been in
existence nine years. In some years
as many as 10000 grass shoots have
been set out. These include varieties
from all parts of the world.
Senator Plat and Senator Hawley
(owner OF the Hartford CouranD have
succeeded in getting Congress to pass
an appropriation for a similar pro-
ject in Washington. The Courant re-
Gently published interesting articles
on the grass gardening experiments
in Connecticut. An authority on the
subject is quoted by the Courant as
follows:
This Connecticut garden shows
many grasses that everybody wants
and in a form that nobody ever saw IN
a botanic garden; namely in the every
day form of turf. Except as to the
production and care of permanent turf,
so faithfully shown here, all the prob
lens of grass culture have been illus
trated in gardens fifty and one hun
bred years ago; and the Investigations
and their results treated exhaustive
~ in books
Much Of recent botanic study has
been given to wild grasses-natives of
countries opened TO settlement by
modern travel. while the tried and
proven grasses of the oldest civiliza-
tons have been neglected, or maltreat-
ed and falsified by seed growers and
trading botanists In the grass inves-
LEGATIONS carried on here the reverse
Of this is apparently true, Here the
old. long-established and thoroughly
proven grasses make the most show,
Mr.. olcott has grasses from almost
every country in the world, you might
say. and every one pure culture, has
stood the test tube of climate and eX-
perience."
Mr.. 0loott himself says OF his gar
den: Every method Of culture in
use here is old-based on the oldest
and longest settled principles of gar
dening and agriculture. The roots of n
pasture grass found making the best
turf are parted, planted and forced
10 repeat itself in tough turf or sward
again Common labor, always more or
less familiar with this process, soon,
with practice, becomes expert.
Many of these old grazing grasses
have been proven to bring seeds truly,
each after its kind, and turf, such as
everybody wants. has been grown
manufactured from these seeds-and
from roots also. by machinery and
without grazing animals, in close like
ness of the best pasture products. So
perfect and exact is the reproduction
OF these grasses by their roots, that
l 1000 or 10000 turf-gardens in precise
duplicate OF each other, could be plant
ed from the stocks here within a year,
II this should be desirable and the
means were afforded. And this with
varieties in procedures which are
practically cosmopolitan in their origin
as well as in their adoption TO the
needs of agriculture and gardening.
Nothing like this can be said of any
one or all the other grass gardens of
the world combined. None of them
are ready to do this work even if the
money were forthcoming to do 1t with.
Five minutes study of turf-plant-
ing by an expert machine tobacco
planter would satisfy him that the only
trouble in planting grass roots in acres
daily, by machinery, is to get the right
stock in sufficient quantity. In this
garden there is stock enough for one
hundred acres. Botanic gardens have
never even tried to meet this universal
demand. Hundreds of people ask me
where the practical application of this
garden lies.
DO you see that grass road? Good
enough turf, isn't it? You can't match
IL in these states. 1t is composed of
the plants whose seeds came from the
old countries in the hair and stockings
of our ancestors. That is the turf of our
daddies. Had we minded our eyes
had we continually asked the careful
farmer to grow and keep that sort of a
sward for Us-instead of climbing some
other way-we might have had it all
over the country any time these 200
years.
That grass road has received no
manure or seeds for 35 or 40 years. Not
a plant remains in it which my father
Willingly sowed, but he kept sheep,
his water-meadows were covered with
fine red-top and white clover, and his
manure was full of their seeds.
BY close machine-grazing and weed
ing-doing the work of flock of sheep
we have developed the dormant
grasses of the soil-the very hand
writing of our grazing ancestors.
THAT road had three sorts of chick
weeds in it. You don't see them, but
there is enough there yet to destroy
all the grasses and clovers, if it was
managed as your lawns and parks are
managed, or your pastures where
everything is permitted to go to seed
that cattle won't eat.
Right alongside, you see the turf
garden proper, receiving fertilizers
every year, with some better turf
grasses in it. no doubt, than are in the
grass road-which, as I said. has re-
ceived no manure And the grass road
feeds itself better than have fed the
turf-garden proper with annual and
semi-annual top-dressing of COM
mercial fertilizers. The garden is
often nearly destroyed in parts by rusts
and worms; the road is never rusty,
and If worms are there they do not