No. 63.] 105 



on it during the eight years.* In England^the following course is prac- 

 ticed with much success, and with some variation might do well here. 

 First year turneps; second, barley; third and fourth, clover; fifth, 

 wheat; sixth, beans and peas; seventh, wheat. For the turneps and 

 the beans substitutes would have to be provided. Corn might take 

 the place of the first, and peas that of the last. In the wheat grow- 

 ing districts of this country, the rotation of crops is very simple. It 

 is first wheat with clover seed; second, meadow or pasture; third, 

 meadow or pasture plowed in July; fourth year wheat. Sometimes 

 the plowing takes place one year earlier, making a wheat crop every 

 third year. But this cannot be recommended, as such a course can- 

 not fail to exhaust the soil, however fertile in the outset. It is well 

 known that Belgium exceeds all other countries in its products on a 

 given quantity of land. The following, from the excellent work on 

 Flemish Husbandry, will show at once a favorite course of rotation, 

 and the manner in which the Flemish farmer manures his lands. 

 This was naturally a stiff clay loam, but by cultivation and manuring 

 it has been converted into a soil, fine, mellow and brown, resembling 

 the best garden mold: 



1. Potatoes, with twenty tons of dung per acre. 



2. Wheat, with three and a half tons, and fifty barrels of urine. 



3. Flax, with twelve tons of dung, fifty barrels urine, and five cwt. 

 rape [oil] cake. 



4. Clover, with twenty bushels wood ashes. 



5. Rye, with eight tons dung, fifty barrels urine. 



6. Oats, with fifty barrels urine. 



7. Buckwheat, no manure. 



"With us, the urine so liberally and profitably used by the Flemish 

 husbandman, is mostly if not wholly lost; and though, as a stimu- 

 lant, its powers are mostly exerted on the first crop, its effects on the 



• The following course is a favorite one in some of the best cultivated districts of Penn- 

 sylvania; corn, then oats, then wheat, then rye, then clover and timothy. One oat field 

 and one clover field, fallowed for wheat. Manure is applied to the wheat; lime and plas- 

 ter are also used freely. The crops of two farmers in the vicinity of Lancaster, will illus- 

 trate this course ; the first is of 40, and the second of 200 acres : 



No. 1. 



Acres. Produce. 



5 Corn, 300 bushels. 



10 Wheat, 340 do 



5 Oats, 300 do 



5 Rye, 100 do 



10 Hay, 30 tons. 



5 pasture. 



[Senate No. 63.J O 



No. 2. 

 Acres. Produce. 



30 Corn, 1,500 bushels. 



40 Wheat, 1,200 do 



30 Oats, 1,£00 do 



60Hay, 90 tons. 



40 pasture. 



[See Mr. Miller's Report.] 



