78 Lois-Weedon WlLeat-growing 



proceeds 6/. IO5. 4i(/. per acre. The total expenses were 

 5Z. I85. 04c?. ; leaving me a profit of 125. 4f/. per acre. 



Hoping- for a more fortunate summer, I again drilled my 

 experimental field. In May, with a singularly backward spring, 

 the plant was thin and much nipped by frosts and winds, but 

 it tillered very much, and was more forward than any other 

 wheat on the farm. Hand-hoeing, when the ground was very 

 hard, injured the wheat ; and another operation with the horse- 

 cultivator buried such long portions of the green rows that I 

 anticipated, from this cause, a loss of at least a couple of bushels 

 an acre. In June, after long I'ains and cold winds (a hurricane 

 had much damaged all the wheats), my wheat was 40 to 45 

 inches high, with stout stems, broad flags, and many ears out, 

 some of them very large. I considered the crop a fair one, 

 though not heavy, and looked for " say 30 bushels per acre if 

 the wheat ripen well." Such was the entry then made in my 

 book. In the latter part of July, after great rains, the wheat was 

 5 to 5^ feet high ; the ears long and large, many of them 6 or 

 6| inches in length, with "twelve sets" of spikelets. Owing 

 to very cold weather, deluges of rain, stormy winds, and ex- 

 tremely cold nights, the wheats of the district ripened late and 

 very imperfectly ; and I was doomed to suffer the disadvantage 

 of another specially bad season for my experiment. Light 

 though lengthy ears betokened what the yield would be ; and 

 the thrashing-day gave me but 22 bushels per acre of dressed 

 corn, and 2^ pecks of tail. Though " Emperor " red, it was of 

 such mean quality as to weigh only 55 lbs. per bushel, and was 

 sold at 445. 6^. per quarter. 



The grain realized 6/. 85. Id. per acre ; the crop, however, 

 was so bulky that the straw was estimated at 2 tons (as in the 

 previous year), and valued at 125., making the total receipts 

 6/. 155. Id. per acre. Deducting the total expenses, bl. IO5. 2hd., 

 I had left a profit of 11. 5s. 4:^d. per acre, even for this unlucky 

 crop of 1860. Remembering that this was the sixth cereal crop 

 in annual succession, and the seventh amiual corn-crop since the 

 land had been manured, I considered the experiment conclusive 

 in favour of the Lois-Weedon principle. Undertaken with land 

 in an improper condition, begun at a wrong time, and unfortunate 

 in meeting with two most disastrous seasons (locally, whatever 

 they may have been in other parts of the kingdom) " the stripe 

 wheat " had nevertheless brought me a profit, owing to the loxc 

 cost of cultivation j)ertaining to the sy stein. 



My average yield for the four years had been 25| bushels 

 of dressed corn, and 3J pecks of light tail per acre ; and, sold at 

 an average of 425. lOifZ. per quaiter, it had left mc a fair profit. 



