THE FARMERS' REGISTER. 



303 



be beyond all doubt or cavil— for we shall sum- 

 mon as that witness Mr. Turner himself. 



If no change of crops be necessary, why does 

 Mr. Turner follow corn by oats, and oats by 

 grass"? If there be no necessity for, or superior 

 profit in this succession, why not as well reverse 

 the order of these crops, or keep corn always on 

 one field, oats on another, and grass on the re- 

 mainder of the farm? If the answer be, that al- 

 though corn might well follow corn, and oats fol- 

 low oats, yet that the corn tillage cleans and pre- 

 pares the ground for the growth of oats, and that 

 the oats shelter the young herds-grass and clover, 

 this explanation is, in fact, yielding the whole 

 question, and staling good and sufficient reasons 

 lor the particular succession stated. 



Mr. Turner's rotation is uncommon, and even 

 peculiar. Still it is not therefore less a rotation ; 

 and, according to his peculiar position, we had 

 given him credit for having adopted a rotation o' 

 very valuable features and effects. We especially 

 admired the plan of two successive crops of corn, 

 (though a different kind of hoed crop might have 

 been better in place of one of them,) though such 

 a repetition might have been a barbarous and 

 abominable part of a course of crops at ten miles 

 from a town, or where no putrescent manure 

 could be obtained other than the farm furnished. 

 With Mr. Turner, grass for hay is the most impor- 

 tant and profitable market crop. Oats is the next 

 in importance, and corn is not worth raising for 

 sale, and only desirable for bread, and as a cleans- 

 ing crop to prepare the fields successively for grass. 

 To make the most of this cleansing operation, and 

 because he can make up by purchased manure 

 for the double exaction from the field, he culti- 

 vates two crops of corn in succession, and thereby 

 makes the ground as clean as possible. Still 

 herds-grass and clover would not take well im- 

 mediately after corn ; the shade of oats is requir- 

 ed as shelter from the sun, and even the exhaust- 

 ing power of oats, to keep down weeds, and when 

 reaped, to leave the land wholly to the young 

 grass, when nursed to an age to be able to with- 

 stand both sun and weeds. The land then remains 

 several years in grass, until weeds have gained 

 the ascendency ; when ihe crop and tillage of 

 corn again are resorted to, for the purpose of re- 

 commencing the same rotation. We merely 

 here present reasons, and aim to show that Mr. 

 Turner not only uses a rotation, but one founded 

 on sound principles, according to our views of the 

 theory of rotation. The practice— the facts— 

 the merit of the system— are all his own ; and we 

 have so much respect for his excellent practice, 



in this respect, that we are content to rely on it 

 alone to rebut all his arguments against Ihe ne- 

 cessity of rotations, even were his witnesses, and 

 particular facts of exceptions to general rules, ten 

 times as many and as cogent as they are. 



Mr. Turner has been singularly unlucky in one 

 case adduced as practical proof of there being no 

 necessity for a change of crops. In this case 

 Nature is the cultivator, and her farm "is the 

 world, and the crops are ihe immense forests 

 with which it is covered" — and Mr. Turner adds, 

 " here too is no relief from rotation, for the same 

 crop has been on the land for thousands of years." 

 (p. 322.) Now the actual facts arc directly the 

 reverse — and so striking, that they have been 

 often cited by writers as proofs of the necessity of 

 changes of growth. The ordinary growth of a 

 forest, even at the same lime, is far from being the 

 same crop. There are many difTerent trees, as 

 different in kind, and in their habits and wants, 

 and products of manure by their decay, as the 

 different kinds of cultivated grains and grasses. 

 Therefore, even though the composition of a fo- 

 rest might appear to be unchanged in general, for 

 thousands of years, yet it probably is the case that 

 entire changes are perpetually made in the 

 death and replacing of each tree. For example, a 

 pine may occupy its place for a century, and then 

 die, and be succeeded, not by another pine, but 

 by an oak, which may stand for five centuries, 

 and then be succeeded by a beech or poplar. 

 But Nature is not satisfied with this gradual 

 change and rotation by mixing crops. When fires, 

 the depredations of insects, inundations, or tillage, 

 have' completely destroyed a forest growth, ano- 

 ther succeeding growth is generally of trees en- 

 tirely diflferent. Thus, if a forest principally of 

 oak, short-leaved pine, hickory, dogwood and 

 chinquapin, in lower Virginia be cut down, and 

 the land suffered to grow up again, (either early or 

 late,) the next growth of trees will be almost ex- 

 clusively of pine, and that of a difl^erent kind (the 

 " old field pine,") (rom those which formed part 

 of Ihe previous cover. This is a fact notorious to 

 every resident of this region. In other regions 

 the changes of kind are different, but not less 

 marked than these. And so complete have been 

 such changes, and such totally new growths of 

 trees produced, that many persons, and even some 

 men of science, have thence believed in the spon- 

 taneous production of such new growth, or equi- 

 vocal generation of the new trees, because they 

 could not conceive whence their seeds had been de- 

 rived. Such facts and proofs, directly opposed to 

 Mr. Turner's position, are too numerous to be 

 cited here. -The subject is however curious and 



