FACTS FOR FARMERS.

Waikato Times, Volume IV, Issue 229, 28 October 1873, Page 2

FACTS FOR FARMERS.

Tbeatment or Young Pastures. — Sir, — Would you kindlj inform me if any use can be made of prronnial rye grass the same year it is sown, and, if 60, what method would you recommend as being the best td follow? I have sown some land with it, intending to allow cattle to graze on it this year, but now, since the grass is several inches high, and looking extremely well, I am much disappointed on being told that were I to carry out my intentions with roferenco to cattle, I would spoil tbe grass for future years — in fact, that it would thus jinake the plant an annual. My queries may be summed up as follows : — Would it injure the grass to allow »,toek to graze on it this year ? Were it to be mown, should the feed be allowed to ripen and fall in the paddock, and thus grow up next year ? And when could I with safety allow stock to graze on it ? — W. — [Rye grass may be depastured the first year without injury, provided the stocking be judiciously done. If it is stocked too early, or when the ground is moist and soft, the plants will be liable to be pulled up. It should not be permitted to seed, but it may be mown early, before the seed is formed. Heavy stock should be kept off tbe land whenever it is soft enough for their feet to poach it. If we had a choice we would stock new grasses with calves, but such option is not commonly presented to owners of suburban paddocks. The free use of the roll would tend to benefit the pasture. _In March, or just before the autumn rains, a little seed should be scattered on thin or bare spots. If this practice be continued yearly, and the paddock be never overstocked, a perfect sole of rye graes may be formed and maintained. — E». Australasian ~] Transplanting at Night.— lt has always been the practice among gardeners to set out plants, upon which there were any leaves, late in the evening or just before dark, in order to have them well fixed in the earth before morning. When the buds begin to swell in spring and leaves unfold, new rootlets are being produced with equal rapidity. If we transplant in a dry, warm day, the evaporation of moisture from the leaves is not supplied by the roots, consequently wilting follows ; but at night this evaporation almost entirely ceases, particularly if the dew falls ; bat the growth of rootlets continues, and in a few hours after b;ing replaced in congenial soil, they have made sufficient growth to take up moisture from the earth, and send it forward to the leaves. For the Bame reason we transplant on moist, dark, cloudy days, and obtain far better results than if this operation is performed in dry, clear weather. Plants set out at or just after sundown would succeed better than those removed at midnight, because they would have a few more hours in which to produce new rootlets, before rapid evaporation from the leaves commenced. There is nothing mysterious about this transplanting at night, as some persons would make us believe, but the results are in accordance with wellknown physiological laws. An Inch a Year. — I will give some of my experience in deep and also early ploughing. In June 1868, 1 broke 10 acres of oak grub land, on a ridge, with clay subsoil. I broke about four inches deep. It was a wet season, and the blue-joint grass and artichokes got a good start for the first summer. In the spring of '69 I sowed it with wheat, and dragged it until I felt as though I had been dragged over a corduroy bridge for three weeks. That year I had seven bushels per ncre, and about three tons blue grass and artichokes — the wheat stood about two feet high and the artichokes six. I ploughed it that season the second week in August about one inch deeper than it was broke. In the season of ] 870 I again 6owed with wheat. It was very dry. The grain stood about three-and-a-half feet high without a weed, and the yield was 20 bushels per acre. Ploughed again in August, one inch deeper than before ; next crop stood about four feet high, although a dry season, and the yield was 27 busheli per acre. That season I ploughed it tbe forepart of September, an inch deeper, as usual ; last season , two weeks before harvest, the grain stood five feet high, and some of it six, but by the time it was ready for the reaper it was not as high by three or four feet. Tho yield wm 31J bushels per acre, and I don't think I saved over three-fourths of the crop. Last Fall I did not go down for the extra inch. I fearod if I kept until I got down 15 or 20 inches, the straw would grow 18 or 20 foot high, and that won't stand tho storms of Minnesota ; but if we want long straw and heavy wheat, we must plough deep. One inch deeper each year is plenty, and, if tin* rule it followed strictly, our farmer* will be in good condition 100 years to come. — St. Paul Pioneer.

A lady of a truly manly spirit, accompanied by a small poodle, ia snid to have sadly failed the other day in an attempted reformatory movement. Sbe entered the smoking car of a Western train, and solemnly refused to go into another car, observing that her presence would keep the occupants from smoking. One stony wretch, however, insonsible to the claims of refinement and reform, began to enjoy his accustomed cignr, which was suddenly snatched from his lips, with the remark, in high treble, "If there ia anything Ido hate it is tobacco smoke ! " For a lime the oTender wns silent and motionless, then gravely rising, amid llio plaudits of the assembled smokori, he took that little poodle and gently threw him out of the window, sighing, "If there is anything Ido hate it is a poodle ! " Kn mortal pen cnuld describe the feeling* of that reformer If the whole world should agree to *peaL uoilim^ b it 1 l.c truth, what an abridgement it would make of speecj.