56 REPORT OP THE AGRICULTURE OP AYRSHIRE. 



a weight per acre as the cabbage, but it is far better fitted for 

 storing and keeping — superior in that respect to turnip or even 

 mangold. Like cabbage, and unlike turnip, it does not give any 

 nasty flavour to the milk. 



Ayrshire and Wigtonshire are the only Scotch counties which 

 grow carrots to an extent worth mentioning. Their average, 

 about 400 acres each, being fully the half of all in Scotland 

 Drilled turnips, cabbage, and carrots, were grown experimentally 

 as field crops at Loudon, so early as 1760 ; but the reporter's 

 father was probably the first to begin the field-culture of these in 

 much quantity, between 1800 and 1805, at Assloss, near Kilmar- 

 nock, and at Holmes, near Galston ; he having come west from 

 Angusshire a year or two previously. The high acreage now under 

 carrots, however, is not much imputable to the dairy cattle, al- 

 though most dairy farms grow more or less, from one or two 

 drills up to half an acre or so. They are grown more exten- 

 sively by some of the light-land shore-farmers to supply the 

 demand for them as horse food from Liverpool, Glasgow, and 

 other large towns of the west. From the large trade in iron 

 materials, far more horses proportionally are kept on the west 

 coast, than in such towns as Dundee, Aberdeen, &c, on the east. 

 A good home demand also exists in Ayrshire, and the juice of 

 the red sorts is used by many of the dairy-wives as colouring 

 matter. Large crops of white Belgian are raised on the improved 

 black soils with little manure save a sprinkling of artificials ; 

 and the crop generally in Ayrshire is a paying one, although 

 loss is frequently sustained in the red sorts, when these are 

 attacked by worms. The white variety is much the easiest and 

 safest to grow. Details of carrot culture are needless here, as 

 these can be fully obtained from the prize essay by an Ayrshire 

 farmer, not long since published in the Transactions. Some of 

 the most constant and largest raisers of carrots are in St, Quivox 

 parish, north-east of the county town, as Mr. Robert Wallace, 

 Kirklandholm, and Mr. Templeton, Sand} ford. The former 

 gentleman, also, excepting the Messrs. Imrie of Ayr, and the 

 writer himself, being the only one we know of, who has for lomj 

 and regularly raised turnip-seeds, taking that crop after early 

 potatoes instead of wheat. 



A drill or so of parsnips may be seen occasionally, but that 

 is about the most. This vegetable is more nutritious and of 

 easier cultivation than carrot, besides having a greater adapta- 

 bility to different kinds of soils. Either for throwing rich milk, 

 or fattening quickly, it is probably superior to any other of the 

 cultivated roots ; and to the small holders of Ayrshire, with per- 

 haps not more than an acre of green crop in all, parsnips are un- 

 doubtedly deserving of more regard. 



Little, if any, Rape is grown in Ayrshire, excepting now and 



