158 THE PIEDMONT REGION. 



fluence of frosts in this mild climate. The additional expense is also a 

 consideration. To the limited extent to which it is done, five reports 

 give the results as good, and in York and in portions of Chester, it is re- 

 ported as greatly on the increase ; five other reports state that it is of 

 doubtful advantage or none. 



Rotation of crops is nowhere reduced to a system. With a moderate 

 use of manures, and careful culture, the same lands are planted for years 

 in cotton, it is thought not only without deterioration, but with actual 

 improvement. The ratio which the price of cotton bears to that of meat 

 and corn affects the succession of crops more than anything else. Never- 

 theless, there is but one opinion as to the beneficial influence of a rotation 

 of crops as a cheap means of preserving the thriftiness of the soil. The 

 succession of crops, as elsewhere in the State, is cotton, corn and small 

 grain. The clean culture of cotton leaves the land in good order for any 

 crop, and the small grain is planted in the same year, after the corn is 

 gathered. Usually, the Jand is kept in cotton from three to five years, 

 and after one crop of corn and small grain is taken from it, the culture 

 of cotton is resumed. 



FALLOWIXG. 



Fallowing forms no part of the system of culture, and it is thought that 

 the exposure of the soil, by tillage, to the summer sun is injurious. The 

 fallows consist chiefly of the lands lying out after the small grain crops 

 are gathered, in May and June, and even these are generally used as pas- 

 tures for stock. The 



OLD FIELDS 



are preferred, in many instances, to wood lands, and they are being 

 cleared of the short leaf pine that covers them, and replanted. They pro- 

 duce well with fertilizers, and, under careful treatment, are thought equal 

 to any of the land. One of the principal reasons for abandoning these 

 lands in the first instance Avas the washes and gullies produced by the 

 unskillful use of tlie plow. Efforts to remedy this by horizontal culture 

 and hillside ditches, where intelligently made — especially where the 

 plumb or the level has been used to lay off the rows and ditches — have 

 been very successful. Unskillfully made ditches, however, often do more 

 harm than good. Filling the gullies with brush is a safer and a ver}' 

 effective practice, but no attempt at under drainage, to remedy washing, 

 has been made. The damage to the soil is mainly to the hillsides, and 

 it is seldom the bottoms are injured by the detritus they receive. 



