No. 105.] 171 



having at an early day connected themselves with the society, and 

 become deeply interested in its success, having long watched the 

 progress of agriculture in this State, and feeling, in common with 

 their associates, its members, that no labor on their part should be 

 omitted to carry out their objects, beg leave to submit a few remarks 

 in connection with their report, and upon such subjects as would 

 naturally suggest themselves after an examination of the subject com- 

 mitted to them. 



The first series of questions to which answers were required, are, 

 ^' The kind of soil cultivated, and the manner of doing it." The 

 answers to the first branch of this subject are such as any ordinary 

 intelligent farmer would make, and which were tolerably well under- 

 stood, perhaps enough for practical purposes. Indeed, the committee 

 found it so ; but the second branch of inquiry, viz : " What is the 

 best mode of improving the different kinds of soil on your farm," 

 admits of great latitude of remark, inasmuch as it is universally con- 

 ceded that the different kinds of soil, such as clay, sand, gravelly 

 loam, alluvial, or a mixture of two or all the different varieties, must, 

 to be profitable, be cultivated somewhat differently. 



The committee will not go into this extensive inquiry. They will 

 take up only one important part of it, and that is the query, " What 

 depth do you plow, and what effect has deep plowing had on various 

 soils and crops." Upon reading over the several communications in 

 answer to this inquiry, and as connected with it, the use of the sub- 

 soil plow, it will be noticed that the general answer is that the several 

 individuals plow to the depth of from five to seven inches, in one 

 instance I believe to twelve ; and that all speak in general terms of 

 deep plowing as beneficial, I think without one dissenting voice. 

 But it must be observed that in no instance does any one give this 

 opinion as the result of careful investigation, founded on a set of 

 experiments intended, as far as can be done, to settle this question. 

 They simply state it as a conviction founded on general observation. 

 The conclusion drawn is probably correct ; it is so at least as far as 

 the observation of one of the committee has gone. It is only to be 

 wished, from the importance of the interest involved, that the dif- 

 ference in results of produce from shallow or deep plowing, wide or 

 narrow furrows, one or repeated plowings, and the plowing up every 

 inch of ground or the leaving half a dozen or more baulks in each fur- 



