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out. The best wheat-lands, which have astonished the world by their 
enormous production, are visibly declining in fertility. 
In Oregon, only two counties report even an approximate system of 
rotation. The abundance of land owned by individual farmers enables 
them to rest the soil, yet there are instances of long succession of crops. 
In Linn County a thirteenth wheat crop (Australian spring) averaged 
264 bushels per acre. The cultivation in this case was thorough, em- 
bracing two plowings, the first 10 or 12 inches and the second 6 inches. 
Very few of these repeated crops, however, have received any such cul- 
tivation as is seen in the declining fertility of some of the finest wheat- 
iands. 
SOIL IMPROVEMENT. 
In many counties of New England efforts for the permanent improve- 
ment of the soil are intelligent and energetic. In others, however, but 
little is done except with reference toimmediate results. Many farmers 
are more or less dependent on manufacturing, lumbering, fishing, or 
some other outside calling for a living, and consequently give but minor 
attention to the cultivation of the soil. Others own but a few acres, 
and are destitute of the capital necessary to make improvements or 
even to arrest the deterioration of their lands. Hence from some quar- 
ters come complaints of declining fertility. But the necessity and the 
practicability of retaining and even of enhancing the natural fertility of 
the soil have lately awakened more general attention and have led to 
some systematic and well directed enterprise in this direction. 
Barn-yard manure is universally used. The accumulations of the 
stables and vaults of the numerous cities and manufacturing towns, 
after supplying the market gardeners and truck-farmers in their imme- 
diate neighborhood, are in some cases transported hundreds of miles 
into the interior by river and rail. . This long transportation, however, 
renders the material too costly for extensive employment in general 
farming. On the farms it is sometimes saved with extreme care, while 
in many cases it is to a great extent wasted. Among the best-farmers, 
in all this region, barns have been constructed with especial refer- 
ence to the saving of both solid and liquid excrements of farm ani- 
mals. These are composted with muck, sawdust or any other material 
that will absorb ammonia. The droppings of the hog-pen and of the 
hen-roost are, by many farmers, carefully gathered and added to the 
barn-yard heap. Night-soil is used near the cities. Sometimes these 
fertilizers are plowed under for the corn crop; sometimes they are ap- 
plied as a top-dressing, especially upon grass crops. Near the coast 
large quantities of lobster-refuse, menhaden, and other fish manures are 
used. On some soils they produce valuable results, but upon others 
their application has not been so satisfactory. Sea-weed, salt-marsh 
hay, and other vegetable débris are eagerly sought after. Commercial 
fertilizers are extensively used in a few localities, but in others they 
have lost favor. Nova Scotia plaster is a great favorite in Chittenden 
County, Vermont. In several localities in Massachusetts, Rhode Island, 
and Connecticut, guano and superphosphates are extensively employed. 
The tobacco-growers of Hartford, Connecticut, especially favor concen- 
- trated fertilizers and claim very remunerative results from their use. 
‘Haney farmers, gardners, and fruit-growers, with city business,” also 
use them extensively, but it is intimated that in many cases the expense 
overruns the profits. Green-soiling and clovering are but little used. 
Our correspondent in Carroll County, New Hampshire, censures the 
plowing under of green crops upon the following grounds: 
