MAESH AND SWAMP. 9 



ent from the surrounding upland soil types. This class of soil is 

 usually considered more fertile and more lasting under cultivation 

 than similar surface soils underlain by gray or whitish sand. 



Wherever the timber has been cleared from these pocoson areas 

 and the soil properly drained, aerated, and limed, yields of 35 to 75 

 bushels of corn are obtained in a fair season. The use of lime is con- 

 sidered absolutely essential to sweeten these soils before any crops 

 may be grown upon them. In addition to corn, which is the staple 

 crop upon these drained areas, cotton, hay, and late truck crops are 

 produced in the Middle Atlantic States. In some parts of the coun- 

 try such soils are known to be well adapted to the production of 

 celery, cabbage, onions, and lettuce. It has been discovered through 

 experience that it is not well to plant lettuce or onions upon these 

 soils when recently drained. The land should be cultivated to corn 

 or cotton or some other crop for one or two years before an attempt 

 is made at more intensive forms of farming. In all cases the heavy 

 liming of the soil is essential to the best crop production. 



In the more southern group of the Atlantic seaboard States con- 

 siderable areas of Swamp have been drained and diked and prepared 

 for flooding, so that rice may be grown. Usually a dike is thrown up 

 around the outer margin of the area, particularly in case it is adjacent 

 to tidewater or to a tidewater estuary. In the construction of this 

 dike a ditch is usually dug on the side toward the fields. This con- 

 stitutes a main ditch into which other lateral drains, from 50 to 100 

 feet apart, are led. At different intervals a gate is placed in the dike 

 to permit the water to pass out at low tide and to hold the fresh water 

 back for flooding purposes. 



The finest quality of rice is being produced upon this alluvial 

 Swamp of the South Atlantic coast. The yields range from 40 to 65 

 bushels per acre. Many thousands of acres of Swamp in former 

 years cleared, diked, drained, and used for rice cultivation have 

 been permitted to fall into disuse during the last 25 or 30 years. 

 With increase in the price of rice and with the demand for it as a 

 great American cereal crop, it is probable that hundreds of thousands 

 of acres of excellent rice land, along the coast of the Carolinas and 

 of Georgia, might be utilized again for the growing of this crop. 



Very few areas of Swamp of any large extent have been cleared 

 and cultivated in the Northeastern States or in the North Central 

 States. In some instances where such lands occur adjacent to 

 the larger manufacturing cities small areas have been cleared and 

 cultivated to market garden crops. These crops have usually been 

 cabbage, celery, onions, and potatoes. Sufficient progress has been 

 made in this line to prove conclusively that there are, near the 

 densely populated sections surrounding the manufacturing cities of 

 the Northeastern States, thousands of acres capable of complete 



