16 SOILS OF THE EASTERN UNITED STATES. 



production of peaches. It is only in those locations where the alti- 

 tude is sufficiently high to prevent the early budding of the peaches 

 in the spring and to avoid their destruction at a later date by un- 

 seasonable frosts that the production of peaches may be considered 

 a commercial proposition. Upon the areas having an altitude of 

 approximately 1.200 feet, and especially in locations where the air 

 drainage and wind circulation aids in preventing frosts, commercial 

 peach orcharding has been very successful. The Elberta peach is 

 the one principally grown, although other varieties are also planted. 

 The trees come into bearing at 3 to 5 years of age and maintain a 

 good growth for 15 or 20 years. In general it may be said that the 

 peach orchards when properly located have been more successful 

 upon the medium deep phase of the type where the sandy clay or 

 stiff clay subsoil is encountered at a depth of 8 or 12 inches. Upon 

 the deeper phase the rate of tree growth is not so satisfactory. There 

 are many thousand acres of the type favorably located with regard 

 to altitude, air and water drainage, and transportation, which are 

 still unoccupied by any commercial plantings of peaches. The ex- 

 tension of this industry upon these selected areas might well be 

 undertaken. 



It will be seen from this description of the crop adaptations of the 

 Cecil sandy loam that in the more northern regions there are several 

 alternative crop rotations which are well suited to the type. In the 

 North Carolina- Virginia tobacco region the production of the manu- 

 facturing or export tobacco followed by wheat and that followed by 

 the production of the grass crops, including clover, is probably the 

 best rotation which can be adopted. An alternative rotation is that 

 of corn followed by wheat, followed by grass, in case it is desired to 

 omit the tobacco crop. In more southern locations the annual produc- 

 tion of cotton or the mere alternation of cotton and corn has consti- 

 tuted one of the factors leading to decreased crop yields upon the 

 Cecil sandy loam. It would be far more desirable to plant cotton, 

 to follow this with a winter cover crop such as oats, to succeed this 

 crop with corn in the next year, sowing cowpeas between the rows 

 in midsummer, and pasturing off the cowpeas after the corn crop has 

 been picked. It would then be possible to return to cotton and secure 

 better yields than the average now reported for the type. Whatever 

 rotation is adopted in either section, great care should be taken to 

 incorporate the largest possible amount of organic matter in the 

 soil and all possible supplies of stable and yard manures should be 

 applied to the land. While the Cecil sandy loam is not considered so 

 productive in the majority of areas where it occurs as the Cecil clay, 

 it is more easily tilled than the latter type. Fair average yields are 

 reasonably certain every year and the soil is highly esteemed for the 

 production of the staple crops. 



