90 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



once accustomed themselves to a routine, to adhere to it long 

 after its advantages cease to exist. This is illustrated by the 

 fact that Norfolk, which gave England the four-course system 

 just described, began more than thirty years ago to amend its 

 own improvements. The command of concentrated and arti- 

 ficial fertilizers which admit of easy application at any point 

 in a rotation, led some of the best farmers there to introduce 

 another grain crop — oats — into the shift, making a five years 

 course, and according to Caird, in his " English Agriculture," 

 " on a large" farm where this system has supplanted the four 

 years course the average produce of all the grain crops has in- 

 creased in ten years between thirty and forty per cent. ; the 

 extent of land on this farm in wheat, having during that pe- 

 riod annually increased till it has now (1850-51) become 

 one-third greater than it was then." 



In Great Britain, Germany, and other European countries, 

 you will find in many localities very complicated systems of 

 rotation. I saw the other day, in a book which I was looking 

 into for some statistics, a long and curions calculation, show- 

 ing the various materials — lime, potash, phosphoric acid, <fec. 

 — taken off and put on a farm, which was divided into ten 

 equal fields, and each of these fields, went through succes- 

 sively with the same ten years' rotation; which was : 1, Sum- 

 mer Fallow, manured. 2, Winter Coleseed. 3, Wheat and 

 Rye. 4, Legumes, manured. 5, Rye. 6, Potatoes. 7, Clover 

 and grass. 8, Clover hay. 9, Pasture till 1st July, then 

 summer fallow. 10, Rye and Wheat, " half manured." 



It is a great advantage, in the conduct of a large estate of 

 four or five hundred acres, to have the whole system of crop- 

 ping made up beforehand, so that the men can tell just what 

 is to be done from year to year. Tlie management of farm 

 labor is simplified by this arrangement. That is one of the 

 reasons why such complicated rotations are adopted. 



It should be well borne in mind that while there are cir- 

 cumstances in which rotation is extremely advantageous 

 there are other circumstances under which it is compara- 

 tively unimportant. Certain conditions make rotation neces- 

 sary, and others make it unnecessary. There are two kinds 



