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oats, rye, and hay do well, but our reporter says : “Our farmers have long prac- 
ticed the skimming system of farming.” In the northwestern part of Mont- 
gomery county a fine quality of tobacco is raised, claimed to be equal to any in 
the State, the planters selling from $200 to $250 from an acre. Our corres- 
pondent in this county says: ‘‘When the land is well manured and _ culti- 
vated it yields from forty to sixty bushels of corn per acre, from one hundred 
to three hundred bushels of potatoes, fifteen to twenty bushels of wheat, thirty 
to fifty bushels of oats, and from one and one-half to three tons of hay to the 
acre, but the average is much below these figures.’”’? The corn crop is made a 
specialty in Baltimore county, the aggregate yield of 1860 being over one 
million bushels, and the crop of 1867 about 1,240,000 bushels. The grain is 
taken to Baltimore and much of it exported, this disposition of the crop being 
considered more remunerative than feeding it to stock. Large profits are 
derived from this crop, the soil being well adapted to its growth. Mode of 
culture: the ground is ploughed either in the fall or spring, and put in good order, 
the rows laid off two ways, about three and one-half feet apart, and the corn 
worked well both ways. Planting begins about the Ist of May. It is usual to 
thin out the stalks and leave but two to the hill.” 
From Queen Anne county our reporter writes : “Our principal crops are corn, 
wheat, and fruit. Ihave been in this county since 1851, and I can safely say 
that, by the use of lime, phosphates, and guano, with clover rotations, the grain 
crop has been more than doubled, while the growth of fruit, which has originated 
only within the last six or eight years, promises, from its remarkable success, to 
be our principal pursuit. With existing and prospective railroad facilities our 
peaches will be in the New York market the day after they are picked. Well- 
improved lands yield from forty to sixty bushels of corn to the acre, and it is 
our most profitable grain crop. Of wheat twenty bushels in fallow with clover 
lea, and twelve on corn ground, drilled in with superphosphate. Some of 
our stiffer lands will bring more wheat, but are not so well adapted to corn or 
fruit.” 
In Anne Arundel county fruit and market gardening, especially strawberries, 
command much attention, the latter crop having been increased ten-fold in as 
many years, and nearly doubled in the last year, paying a net profit of from 
$160 to $400 per acre. 
Tobacco is considered the most profitable crop in St. Mary’s county, though 
wheat and corn are largely cultivated. 'The production of wheat appears to be 
declining, and failures are frequent with the more careless farmers. Our 
reporter adds, however, that his neighbor, “one of the best farmers in the county, 
who ploughs deep and manures well, is uniformly successful, having had but 
one failure in ten or twelve years, a circumstance which ought to modify the 
general practice hereabouts.” 
5. Winter wheat alone is cultivated in Maryland, of which the varieties sown 
are numerous, including red and white Mediterranean, Tappahannock, German 
Black, or Lancaster, Blue Stem, Purple Stem, Columbia, Walker, White Flint, 
Red Chaff, &c., but the red Mediterranean is generally preferred for its hardi- 
ness, early ripening, and resistance to midge, rust, and other diseases. In 
Washington county the “ Lancaster” improvement on the Mediterranean is 
now in high favor and largely sown; but a change of seed is found necessary 
every few years, to insure success. ‘The Tappa‘iannock and Mediterranean are 
sown in Montgomery, the latter yielding more, but the former commanding 
higher price. In most of tle other counties reporting the red Mediterranean is 
almost exclusively sown, as the surest and most profitable variety, a number of 
the other kinds grown having become unreliable. 
The seed is sown in the different sections of the State from the middle of 
September to the middle of October, and the crop harvested the latter part of 
June and the first week in July. It is estimated that about two-thirds of the 
