YALE AGRICULTURAL LECTURES. 113 



injurious to the growth of wheat, but it renders the soil cold 

 and retards the ripening of the grain. It has been found, by 

 actual experiment, that a soil which needs draining is from 10 

 to 15 colder than the same soil after it has been underdrained. 

 In our late, cold springs this would be an immense advantage. 

 Having the soil underdrained, the next thing is to prepare and 

 enrich it for the crop. 



The introduction of turnip culture and drill husbandry into 

 England banished summer-fallows from all but the heaviest 

 clay soils. There was good reason for this : The turnips re 

 quired and received extra cultivation. As soon as the wheat 

 crop is harvested, the land is scarified and plowed in the 

 autumn, and two or three times in the spring, and rolled, and 

 harrowed, and scarified till it is as free from weeds and as mel 

 low as an ash-heap ; then the turnips are sown in drills from 

 2 feet to 2| feet apart. The plants are singled out by hand- 

 hoes in the rows, from 12 to 15 inches apart, and the horse- 

 hoe is kept constantly going between the rows, and the hand- 

 hoe whenever necessary. In this way the land is as effectually 

 cleared and mellowed as if it had been summer-followed. 

 Hence turnips have been appropriately termed a " fallow crop." 

 But we have as yet no such fallow crop in America. I am 

 aware that Indian corn is sometimes called a " fallow crop," 

 because, like turnips, it admits the use of the horse-hoe ; but it 

 is not, strictly speaking, a fallow or renovating crop, because 

 it impoverishes the soil of the same plant food as the wheat 

 crop requires. So much has been said in England against sum 

 mer-fallows, and these opinions have been reiterated so often 

 by the agricultural press of this country, for the last 30 years, 

 that there is a very general opinion that summer-fallows is un 

 necessary. This impression, while it may have done some 

 good, has also done considerable harm. Farmers have neg 

 lected their summer fallows. In Western New York it has 

 not been uncommon for some years to prepare land for wheat 

 by simply turning under a crop of clover when in bloom, say 



