Book VI. ROTATION OF CROPS. 739 



4562. Rotation for peat earth soils. These are not friendly to wheat, unless aided by 

 a quantity of calcareous matter. Taking them in a general point of view, it is not advis- 

 able to cultivate wheat, but a crop of oats may almost be depended upon, provided the 

 previous management has been judiciously executed. If the subsoil of peat earth lands 

 be retentive of moisture, the process ought to commence with a bare summer fallow ; but 

 if such are incumbent on free and open bottoms, a crop of turnips may be substituted 

 for fallow ; according to which method, the surface will get a body which naturally it 

 did not possess. Grass, on such soils, must always occupy a great space of every ro- 

 tation, because physical circumstances render regular cropping utterly impracticable. 



1. Fallow, or turnips with dung. 3. Clover, and a considerable circumstances permit the land to 



2. Oats of an early variety. quantity of perennial rye-grass. be broken up, when oats are to be 



4. Pasture for several years, till repeated. 



4563. Rotation for light soils. These are easily managed, though to procure a full 

 return of the profit which they are capable of yielding, requires generally as much at- 

 tention as is necessary in the management of those of a stronger description. Upon 

 light soils, a bare summer fallow is seldom called for, as cleanliness may be preserved 

 by growing turnips, and other leguminous articles. Grass also is of eminent advantage 

 upon such soils, often yielding a greater profit than what is afforded by culmiferous 

 crops. 



1. Turnips. 3. Clover and rye-grass. 



2. Spring wheat, or barley, 4. Oats or wheat. 



This is a fashionable rotation ; but it may be doubted whether a continuance of it for any 

 considerable period is advisable, because both turnips and clover are found to fall off 

 when repeated so often as once in four years. Perhaps the rotation would be greatly 

 improved were it extended to eight years, whilst the ground, by such an extension, would 

 be kept fresh and constantly in good condition. As for instance, were seeds for pasture 

 sown in the second year, the ground kept three years under grass, broke up for oats in 

 the sixth year, drilled with beans and pease in the seventh, and sown with wheat in the 

 eighth ; the rotation would then be complete, because it included every branch of hus- 

 bandry, and admitted a variety in management generally agreeable to the soil, and always 

 favorable to the interest of cultivators. The rotation may also consist of six crops, were 

 the land kept only one year in grass, though few situations admit of so much cropping, 

 unless additional manure is within reach. 



4564. Rotation for sandy soils. These, when properly manured, are well adapted to 

 turnips, though it rarely happens that wheat can be cultivated on them with advantage, 

 unless they are dressed with alluvial compost, marl, clay, or some such substances as 

 will give a body or strength to them, which they do not naturally possess. Barley, oats, 

 and rye, the latter especially, are, however, sure crops on sands, and in favorable seasons 

 will return greater profit than can be obtained from wheat. 



1. Turnips, consumed on the ground. 3. Grass. 



2. Barley. 4, Rye or oats. 



By keeping the land three years in grass, the rotation would be extended to six years, 

 a measure highly advisable. 



4565. These examples are sufficient to illustrate the subject of improved rotations j 

 but as the best general schemes may be sometimes momentarily deviated from with ad- 

 vantage, the same able author adds, that " cross cropping, in some cases, may perhaps 

 be justifiable in practice; as, for instance, we have seen wheat taken after oats with great 

 success, when these oats had followed a clover crop on rich soil ; but, after all, as a gene- 

 ral measure, that mode of cropping cannot be recommended. We have heard of an- 

 other rotation, which comes almost under the like predicament, though, as the test of 

 experience has not yet been applied, a decisive opinion cannot be pronounced upon its 

 merits. This rotation begins with a bare fallow, and is carried on with wheat, grass 

 for one or more years, oats, and wheat, where it ends. Its supporters maintain that 

 beans are an uncertain crop, and cultivated at great expense ; and that in no other 

 way will corn, in equal quantity and of equal value, be cultivated at so little expense, as 

 according to the plan mentioned. That the expense of cultivation is much lessened, we 

 acknowledge, because no more than seven ploughings are given through the whole 

 rotation ; but Whether the crops will be of equal value, and whether the ground will be 

 preserved in equally good condition, are points which remain to be ascertained by ex- 

 perience." {Brown on Rural Affairs.) 



4566. As a general guide to devising rotations on clay soils, it may be observed, that 

 winter or autumn sown crops are to be preferred to such as are put in in spring. Spring 

 ploughing on such soils is a hazardous business, and not to be practised where it can 

 possibly be avoided. Except in the case of drilled beans, there is not the slightest 

 necessity for ploughing clays in the spring months ; but as land intended to carry beans 

 ought to be early ploughed, so that the benefit of frost may be obtained, and as the seed 

 furrow is an ebb one, rarely exceeding four inches in deepness^ the hazard of spring 



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