250 



Bulletin 254. 



age at the same time Mr. Johnston was awarded first prize. Accompany- 

 ing his paper, which appears in the transactions of the New York Agri- 

 cultural Society for that year, is a plot of the tile drains installed on a 

 piece of land of twenty acres now occupied by healthy old apple trees set 

 by him and this plot is reproduced in figure 193. Like the Johnston farm 

 most of the tile are still in good working condition except that some of 

 the outlets have become closed. The marked beneficial effects of the drains 

 is still recognized by the present owners. Ninety acres of the farm which 

 had 65 acres of bearing orchard including the Dwarf pear orchard set by 

 Mr. Yoemans were sold, a few years ago, to the present owner, Mr. G. 



Fig. 193. — Drainage system of 1200 rods on 20 acres of Miami stony loam. Yoe- 

 mans farm, Walworth, N. Y. Arrangement determined by topography of 

 land. Sizes of file: A-B, three 4-inch file; B-C, tzvo yinch tile; C-D, one 

 2,-inch tile and one i-inch tile; D-E, one yinch tile. Remainder of system, 

 one 2-inch tile. 



R. Wignalls. at a very substantial price. So that it may be considered 

 that a very considerable degree of permanency attaches to this type of 

 land improvement. 



In spite of the fact that New York State was the pioneer in tile drain- 

 age in America, she has fallen far behind several of the newer states of 

 the central west in this type of improvement. In these states where ex- 

 isted large areas of land entirely too wet for farming purposes without 

 artificial drainage, tile -draining has been very generally adopted as a neces- 

 sity, not only on such swampy soils but also upon the upland soil. 



New York State needs to recall her early prestige and to remember 

 that very large areas of her soils are not yet beyond the need of better 

 artificial drainage and particularly of tile draining and that large net profits 

 as well as much satisfaction awaits those who take up this improvement 

 with intelligence and discrimination. Some of these benefits may now be 

 summarized. 



