THE FARMER'S MAGAZINE. 



137 



important subject, and hoped to hear the opinion 

 of other members upon it, 



Mr. LiLLiNGTON said he once saw their chair- 

 man subsoiling a piece of land, of which he seemed 

 to have made a capital job. He should like to 

 know whether he had found any benefit from it. 



The Chairman replied that he had not, and 

 further observed that he perfectly agreed with the 

 practical observations of Mr. Clarke. He did 

 think — and in doing so, he somewhat differed with 

 Mr. Saunders — that the soil to plough deep was 

 the best soil. Now, Mr. Saunders did not think 

 that answered so well as ploughing the thin soil 

 and bringing the chalk up a little at a time. He 

 (the chairman) had tried that on his farm, where 

 he could not go four inches without getting upon 

 the chalk, and when he had brought a little up, he 

 found that he could not grow wheat on it for years, 

 therefore, he thought they did wrong if they went 

 deep on bad soils. He had another experiment, to 

 which Mr. Lillington had alluded, on a piece of 

 sandy land with a light loam on the top, which he 

 had subsoiled, but he did not think it did either 

 good or harm. 



Mr. Saunders explained that he could at first 

 scarcely grow any crop at all on the thin piece of 

 land he had alluded to; but after he had gradually 

 worked up the chalk, which had become pulverized, 

 he could grow as many sacks as he could bushels 

 before. 



Mr, Lillington observed that by putting a 

 good deal of manure it would make soil. 



Mr. Saunders said there was never any depth 

 before. 



Mr. Taylor suggested that if Mr. Saunders 

 had manured it well at first he might have grown 

 a good crop, 



Mr. Sly said he knew it before Mr. Saunders 

 had it, and should not think it was hardly worth 

 the trouble of cultivation. 



Mr. Saunders made a few observations upon 

 the miserable crops he found on the piece when he 

 went to view the farm. 



Mr. Reader said the opinion seemed to be 

 various as to what soils they should deepen and 

 what they should not deepen. Now there were a 

 great many opinions as to deepening soils on chalk 

 farms. On the wolds of Yorkshire they do not like 

 deepening the soil where it is upon chalk. Their 

 opinion is that the chalk forms a bed, and when 

 once they broke that bed, where it was a thin soil, 

 they were more liable to lose the manure. Whether 

 their chalks were soft or hard he could not say. 

 The different nature of the chalks in his opinion 

 ought to have a very great influence on this ques- 

 tion ; because they were well aware that there were 

 some chalks in this neighbourhood which, if 



brought to the surface, would take years to pul- 

 verize and come to what was termed a white earth. 

 There were other chalks not very far distant which 

 a week's frost would bring into as fine particles as 

 the other soil. They knew very well that where 

 they had chalk and put a large quantity on light 

 soils, they lost all their wheat plants ; but too great 

 a quantity could scarcely be put upon the heavy, 

 strong soils. He had no doubt in his own mind 

 that, if they had got a soft chalk, and if they could 

 deepen the soil gradually by not bringing too much 

 to the top at once, and the previous soil v/as of 

 anything like a strong nature, they would benefit 

 by it. But, at the same time, the question was, 

 when is that to be done ? He did not think they 

 ought to do it anything like previous to wheat, or 

 in the spring. His opinion was that it should be 

 done in the fall, on the stubble, previous to roots. 

 Deep cultivation for roots is beneficial, and they 

 could always see in these where hedges and ditches 

 had been levelled ; but he could not say the same 

 with regard to corn crops. Wheat was not better 

 for deep cultivation, and when the deepening did 

 take place, it ought to be for the root crops, after 

 the wheat. The worst thing they could do was to 

 bring up white or black sand, as it was not often 

 they got a clay upon that ; if so, it might be bene- 

 ficial. He had been looking over some experiments 

 on this subject, and the parties stated that, if land 

 required draining, it ought not to be subsoiled until 

 two years after the draining, and for the root crop, 

 when it did a great deal of good ; but subsoiling 

 clay did more harm than good, if not drained. 

 They also stated that they never experienced any 

 benefit from subsoiling clay, except where stones 

 were intermixed with it. Another experiment was 

 made with deep ploughing for potatoes. The land 

 was ploughed and worked ten inches deep, and 

 produced 23 cwt. of potatoes more than that 

 ploughed and worked five inches deep. The same 

 field ploughed for wheat the following fall, some 

 portion of it ten inches deep produced 27 bushels 

 per acre; whilst that ploughed five inches deep 

 produced 31^ bushels per acre. Another portion 

 ploughed three inches deep produced 32 bushels 

 per acre. The deep ploughing produced the most 

 straw, and to the casual observer was the best crop, 

 and this showed the necessity of carrying out ex- 

 periments to the end, and carefully comparing the 

 results. An experiment was also made in another 

 field, where clover land was ploughed for wheat : 

 one portion of the field was ploughed five inches 

 deep, producing 34 bushels of wheat per acre, and 

 the other part was ploughed three and a-half inches 

 deep, producing 37 bushels per acre. The same 

 field was managed in three different ways : one 

 portion grubbed to the depth of twelve incheis three 



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