Sawgrass

“ The soil of the rather level sageland in most places is rocky or gravelly, or, as adjacent to washes, it is finely sandy in texture, and supports the major plants of the association. Most of the eroded adobe banks at the bases of the foothills support these same plants, with white sage being the dominant species. Locally, as in damp hollows or cleared areas, there is grassland. Jumbles of boulders, sand, gravel, and steep cutbanks, are characteristic of the channels of dry washes, these areas supporting sparse vegetation. ”

“ Most of our State Forests and Waters nurseries in their seedling beds, plant their seedlings, including chestnuts, make a mixture of sawdust and sand, about one of sawdust and two of sand, and then broadcast that right over their seeds. The seeds are broadcast on the firm soil, then this mixture of sawdust and sand is broadcast over the seeds. That gives a uniform planting of your seeds and gives a very nice protection. There is one place that I think sawdust works very nicely.
Straw mulch, any material of that kind, in breaking down takes nitrogen from the soil. ”

“ Sawmills make no distinction between the different species. All that comes is buckeye, but nearly all of it is the yellow species, though doubtless a little of all the others is cut into lumber and veneer, or goes to the slack cooperage shop, or to the pulp mill. The woods of all are quite similar, and they are used for the same purposes. If one is employed in larger quantities than another, it is because it is more convenient, or of better form or larger size. ”

“ Water must be given regularly until about midsummer, when the pots may be plunged to the rim in a shady border, and this will keep them tolerably moist until, in September, the seedlings begin to ripen off, which they must be allowed to do. When the leaves have died down, shake out the bulbs and place them on a shelf to dry. A mixture of equal parts of peat and pine sawdust, placed in a box or seed-pan, will make the best possible store for them; the box or seed-pan to be kept in any spot which is safe from heat and frost. ”

“ Sometimes for miles the only vegetable growth we found along the river was a string of willow bushes, fringing its course, and scattered, stunted sagebrush, growing feebly in gravel and dry sand, the leaves of which were partly withered and of a pale, ashy tint. Feed for the animals was very scarce. ”

“ The sage-brush is a singularly hardy plant, and grows right in the midst of deep sand, and among barren rocks, where nothing else in the vegetable world would try to grow, except "bunch-grass."— ["Bunch-grass" grows on the bleak mountain-sides of Nevada and neighboring territories, and offers excellent feed for stock, even in the dead of winter, wherever the snow is blown aside and exposes it; notwithstanding its unpromising home, bunch-grass is a better and more nutritious diet for cattle and horses than almost any other hay or grass that is known—so stock-men say.] ”

“ Enthusiasts discovering individual trees which have made prodigious growth, or even fairly extensive stands on fertile soil with heavy rainfall, will compute sawlog yields at 40 or 50 years which are much too optimistic for general application. Others, remembering some stand they have seen in unfavorable localities, or noting shade-suppressed trees which will not be paralleled after the virgin forest is removed, are unduly discouraged. ”

“ Within Sound of the Saws.
Lumber had gone up, and the big mill on the Aspohegan was working overtime.
Through the range of square openings under the eaves the sunlight streamed in steadily upon the strident tumult, the confusion of sun and shadow, within the mill. The air was sweet with the smell of fresh sawdust and clammy with the ooze from great logs just "yanked" up the dripping slides from the river. One had to pitch his voice with peculiar care to make it audible amid the chaotic din of the saws. ”

“ Swayne, likewise, remark, that the Common Timothy-grass is very coarse, of little value for cattle, and does not deserve to be cultivated in England. Notwithstanding such diversity of opinion, we appeal to the authority of Linnæus, who expressly states, that Common Timothy-grass should be sown on lands, which have been newly drained; as it is very luxuriant, attains the height of 3 or 4 feet, and prospers in wet and marshy situations. Farther, we learn from Bechstein, that its stalk grows to the height of 6 feet; that horses, and swine, are exceedingly partial to this grass ”

“ The grasses which fill our meadows are very many of them foreign plants; among these are the vernal-grass, which gives such a delightful fragrance to the new-mown hay. The timothy is also an imported grass; so is the meadow-grass considered as the best of all for pasture; the orchard-grass much esteemed also; and the canary-grass, which yields a seed for birds. Some of the most troublesome weeds of this tribe are naturalized, as the darnel in pastures, the chess or cheat of the grain-fields; quaking-grass, quitch-grass, yard-grass, and crab-grass, also. ”

“ Of fresh sawdust, even that from hard woods, he says that it can hardly be considered an economical manure; it is far inferior, for compost, to peat. But, curiously enough, the chemical evidence goes to show that it is for feeding animals rather than for feeding plants that sawdust might be put to use. Fresh sawdust, even that of pine trees, can be used with advantage as fodder in times of dearth. Twigs and leaves, as the clippings of vines and hedges, or bushes mown in pastures, are undoubtedly valuable both as manure and forage. ”

“ SAWDUST MAKES GOOD FRUIT TREE MULCH Many kinds of material ranging from paper to glass wool have been used as mulches for fruit trees, discloses J. H. Gourley, of the Department of Horticulture at The Ohio Agricultural Experiment Station. Straw, hay, and orchard mowings have been most commonly used.
In some areas, sawdust and shavings are available in quantity and have been used to some extent for mulches which raises the questions of whether they make the soil acid. ”

“ A few weeks later two-inch planks [Pg 223] were sliced from the log of this tree in a sawmill. The fourth cut split the pith of the tree, and the startled sawyer beheld a number of imbedded cones stuck along and around the pith, the heart of this aged pine. These cones and the numerous seeds which they contained were approximately one hundred and fifty years old. I planted two dozen of the seeds, and three of these were fertile and sprouted. ”

“ Besides the numerous families of real grasses, there is also a great variety of plants cultivated by farmers, to supply their places, and are, therefore, called the artificial grasses.
“In some cases they are of more rapid growth than a crop of grass—in others, the change is of use to the soil. Sainfoin, for instance, of which you see so much in Gloucestershire, is found to be particularly adapted to a soil exhausted by repeated corn crops, because its root enters deeply into the ground, while the fibrous roots of corn spread close to the surface. ”

“ As the reeds and reed canary-grass come up and form a cover—as the sedges grow green and advance to the edge of the water—as the sword-flags lift up and expand, opening from a centre, the sedge-reedling issues from the bushes and enters these vigorous growths, on which he perches, and about which he climbs as if they were trees. ”

“ Another circumstance that recommends them is, that so long as they last, they exact but little labour, and leave the whole force of the farmer to be directed to his arable grounds. [6]
9th. Grasses are either fibrous or tap-rooted, or both. The remarks already made in articles 1, 2 and 3, apply also to them. Timothy, red-top, oat-grass and rye-grass, succeed best in stiff, wet soils. Sainfoin does well on soils the most bare, mountainous and arid; lucern and the trefoils, (or clovers,) only attain the perfection of which they are susceptible, in warm, dry, calcareous earth. ”

“ He seems unacquainted with the fact, that the matter of wood and tree-leaves, especially of the resinous kinds, and those containing much tannin, if not actually pernicious, have very little fertilizing effect—saw-dust has generally no manuring influence, but turns into peat. He also appears to be ignorant, that some kinds of vegetables draw more from the air and water, and others more from the earth; and, especially, that vegetables in a moist climate, depastured or cut before maturity, exhaust the soil much less than when allowed to seed. ”

“ Even the sagebrush attains to some charm of greenness, and where the juniper and cedar and pine lurk in the shades of some of the rocky slopes, the deepest green adds its never-ending comfort and delight to the scene. ”

“ EVEN if you paid a thousand dollars a bushel for your grass seed, and then spent as much more on the preparation of your land, you could not, I am sorry to say, escape having weeds.
The thing to do when you have them is to get rid of them, and this is accomplished only by getting right after them with a persistence proportionate to the abundance of the weeds. The knife is the only real weapon for this. After digging out your weeds, sow in grass seed with the idea of making the grass grow so thick that there will be no place for the weeds to creep in. ”

“ It is perennial; grows on walls, house-tops, and very dry situations, and flowers from June to August.—This species, in the opinion of Dr. Anderson, is the most valuable of the meadow-grasses. Its leaves are firm and succulent; of a dark Saxon-green colour; and grow so closely together, as to form a pile of the richest pasture-grass. Its flower-stalks continue to vegetate very luxuriantly during the summer; and, even in a fading state, the leaves retain their beautiful green cast. The latter are much larger, and more abundant than those of the roughish meadow-grass. ”

“ A friend of Edward at Turriff found four Saw-flies in a piece of a fir tree that [210] was being cut up for firewood. They are called Saw-flies “from the fact that the female possesses, posteriorly, an instrument by which she perforates, or rather saws, holes in trees, into which she drops her eggs. From this it will be seen that the larvæ are woodfeeders. In this country they are by no means numerous, and it is well that they are not, or our forests would shortly disappear; for, in places where they abound, such as in Norway, they destroy hundreds of thousands of trees in a season. ”

“ Systematic exploration has been prevented by the dense growth of saw grass (Cladium effusum) , a kind of sedge, with sharp, saw-toothed leaves, which grows everywhere on the muck-covered rock basin and extends several feet above the shallow water. ”

“ Soon the ground is green with mosses and liverworts and dotted with small fungi, making the first crop of the season. Then the grass leaves weave a new sod, and the exceedingly slender panicles rise above it like a purple mist, speedily followed by potentilla, ivesia, bossy orthocarpus, yellow and purple, and a few pentstemons. Later come the daisies and goldenrods, asters and gentians. Of the last there are three species, small and fine, with varying tones of blue, and in glorious abundance, coloring extensive patches where the sod is shallowest. ”

“ The ash colored sage bush was thought by the early men of the great plains to be poison to the land. It however was one of God's bounties to man. It prevented the soil from being blown away and where it grew the most lavishly, is now found to be the best of soils. Sage bush not only keeps the winds away, but when dead and rotten fills up sand pockets with material rich for all of the small grains. The people of the Yakima valley on the eastern slope of the Cascade mountains, boast that theirs is the garden spot of the Pacific country. ”

“ In making so many new colonies last season, we governed the size of the entrances to exclude robbers, almost entirely with sawdust, and it answered the purpose more completely to our satisfaction, than any other plan we have ever used. Also, when the nights became cool, we banked sawdust clear around the hives, to close the cracks between the hive and bottom board. We are a great friend to sawdust; it keeps down the weeds, gives you a clean place to work, is clean and orderly for a small dooryard for the bees, and enables you to make just such an entrance as you desire. ”

“ Within this paved area not a blade of any green thing is allowed to grow except a single species of grain-bearing grass. Having planted this crop in a circle around, and two or three feet from, the centre of the mound, the insect tends and cultivates it with constant care, cutting away all other grasses and weeds that may spring up amongst it, and all around, outside the farm-circle, to the extent of one or two feet more. The cultivated grass grows luxuriantly, and produces a heavy crop of small, white, flinty seeds, which under the microscope very closely resemble ordinary rice. ”

“ The other grasses have three males and two females. The flowers of this grass give the fragrant scent to hay. I am informed it is frequently viviparous, that is, that it bears sometimes roots or bulbs instead of seeds, which after a time drop off and strike root into the ground. This circumstance is said to obtain in many of the alpine grasses, whose seeds are perpetually devoured by small birds. The Festuca Dometorum, fescue grass of the bushes, produces bulbs from the sheaths of its straw. The Allium Magicum, or magical onion, produces onions on its head, instead of seeds. ”