The Savannah morning news. (Savannah, Ga.) 1900-current, 1903-04-27
Pastures and Meadows-Their Great
Foe, the PerniriOus weed.

South cultivated for so long in hoed
crops-corn and cotton. sugar cane and
tobacco, would be almost entirely free
of pernicious weeds and that we would
have very little trouble with them when
we came to SOW these lands down in
grass or clover. But it would not re-
quire more than a year or two to dem
onstrate that notwithstanding the re-
peated contest, year after year. with
weeds or useless plants, the soil had in
some way been able to accumulate a
considerable variety of them. The day
the hoe was hung up they would be-
gin to put in an appearance, and it
would not be perhaps more than a
couple of years before it would be
quite a natural conclusion that every
bad weed known to botany had a rep
resentative in soil that was thought to
be free of them. One by one, or per-
haps in twos and threes they appear
Ragweed. hogweed, coffee weed, dock.
cockiebur, Unison weed, dog fennel,
white in the spring, yellow in the au-
tumn, sedges, wild carrot, wild onion,
thistles of one kind and another, briars
and a score of other things more or less
bad-altogether a mighty host with a
power for evil almost incalculable
when they make any marked appear
ance in the pasture and meadow. where
we would have nothing but palatable
grass or clover.
These pernicious weeds are enemies
to be calculated upon, fought with and
eXterminated before either pasture or
meadow can be brought to that per-
lection that they have been brought
to in those countries where they have
had a hundred years, at least, to do
the eXterminating in.
We need not be discouraged by the
fact that so long a time may be re-
quired before perfection is attained.
There is much money to be made out
of pastures and meadows long before
they are made perfect fortunately.
The Southern farmer can take $5-per-
acre-land, set or SOW it to grass and
clover, and in twelve months time
have it in shape to produce s25 worth
of beef or pork in the six months fol-
lowing. In another years time it may
produce twice that much. In his er-
forts towards perfection the farmer,
displaying increased intelligence, the
result of experience gained, would i'm
prove upon this. Instead of $25 worth
of beef, the acre might produce hun
dred dollar-milch COW, or the same
value of improved breeding rams-per-
haps a 5000 Georgia colt" No telling
how valuable the product of that acre
in grass and clover as a reputation
for raising fine stock is acquired by
the owner. This is a slight depression,
however.
No one who has made observation of
our Southern commons and native"
pastures need to be told that much the
greater area of them is so infected
with useless weeds as to render it val
ueless, or nearly so for raising animals
of any kind. If it is not dock it is
cocklebur or coffee weed or hogweed
or something as vile that springs up
and soon overshadows the grass and
clover that can do little more than
barely remain alive under such shade
and with the weed roots drinking up
the moisture and absorbing the plant
food that. If made use of by the val
liable plant would convert it into grass
or clover. If not waist high, at least.
Knee high ana capable of producing
more clear money in the shape of beef.
pork and mutton than twice the area
would produce in either corn or cot
ton. These breeding spots of PERM
cious weeds lie along all our water
courses-brancheS, creeks and rivers
flow. They constitute by all odds the
most fertile part of all the land that
has been opened up since the primeval
AK began its work of clearance We
have very little land to open up that
is half as rich as this land now aban-
doned to the yellow dock and the cock
1ebur And when we consider how lit
tie work, comparatively, is needed to
put this land back into the shape of a
good paying investment, we have cause
TO wonder how blind we may become
TO our best interests when infatuated
ana dominated by an idea that we have
no labor suited to anything other than
growing cotton and corn. And the idea
sun prevails that Cotton is King
and so it is-king of its subjects.
All that these abandoned or neglect
ca lands need is the persistent use of
the mower. 1t had better be done with
the moving blade than not done at all
and by this means alone much Of
this now valueless land could be con-
Verted INTO the best of pasture or
meadow. There are thousands of acres
along the Oconee and Ocmulgee and
other smaller rivers in Georgia that are
already set in bermuda grass and much
OF this soil is loamy and deep. 1t does
not stand in need of any blowing so
far as it would help the grass. All that
is needed is to destroy the weeds that
spring and before the grass springs up
and one or another in succession keep
the soil shaded so that the grass can
make little or no growth. In time these
lands VIII be esteemed a rich legacy,
when the right man comes.
AS stated, the implement to restore
them to condition, of usefulness is
the mower. Starting early in the sea-
son about the time the grass is ready
TO grow, the mower should be run over
the land, cutting as close to the ground
as possible the first growth of weeds
Thls should be repeat often enough
TO insure that no weeds go to seed
during the year. 1t is quite likely there
Will be enough pasturage secured as a
result Of the work to pay the expens IS
of 1t even the first year.
AS these soils are fitted chiefly for
either pasture or meadow by virtue of
their being subjected to periodical over
flows the necessary work for restor-
ing them to usefulness should not be
begrudged them.
OF course, such as are not well set
in some grass available for pasture or
moving (and do not allow of being
cultivated steadily, owing to the
fact that they are subject to
overflow should be we'll plow-
ed before being seeded to grass or
clover. As this blowing will not be
call for again under five years-ten
probably, It should be done thorough
~ It should be plowed and cross
plowed and narrowed to the full ex-
tent necessary before the seeds are
given to it Considering that it is 10