86 



CALCAREOUS MANURES-PRACTICE. 



Experiment 11. 



The ground on which this experiment was made was in the midst of 

 nineteen or twenty acres of soil apparently similar in all respects— level, 

 gray sandy loam, cleared about thirty years before, and reduced as low by 

 cultivation as such soil could well be. The land that was marled and mea- 

 sured was about two hundred yards distant from experiment 2, and both 

 places are supposed to have been originally similar in all respects. This 

 land had not been cultivated since 1815, when it was in corn— but had been 

 once ploughed since, in November, 1817, which had prevented broom grass 

 from taking possession. The ploughing then was four inches deep, and 

 in five and a half feet beds, as recommended in ' Arator.' The growth in 

 the year 1820 presented little except poverty grass, (Arisiida gracilis,) 

 running blackberry briers, and sorrel — and the land seemed very little if at 

 all improved by its five successive years of rest. A small part of this land 

 was covered with calcareous sand, (20 per cent.,) quantity not observed 

 particularly, but probably about 600 bushels. 



Results. 1821. Ploughed level, and planted in corn— distance 5^ by 3^ 

 feet. The measurement of spaces nearly adjoining, made in October, was 

 as follows : 

 23 by 25 corn hills, not marled, (in A) made 2^ bushels, or "i 



per acre, 8| > very nearly. 



23 by 25 corn hills, marled, (on the side B) 5f 22| J 



1822. At rest. Marled the whole, except a marked square of fifty yards, 

 containing the space measured the preceding year. Marl 45 per cent, and 

 finely divided — 350 bushels to the acre — from the same bed as that used 

 for experiment 4. In August, ploughed the land, and sowed wheat early 

 in October. 



1823. Much injury sustained by the wheat from Hessian fly, and the 

 growth was not only mean, but very irregular; but it was supposed that 

 the first marled place (on the side B) was from 50 to 100 per cent, better 

 than the last marled, and the last superior to the included square not marl- 

 ed, (A) in as great a proportion. 



1824. Again in corn. The effects of disease from marling were as in- 

 jurious here, both on the new and old part, as those described in experi- 

 ment 10. No measurement of products made, owing to my being from 

 home when the corn was cut down for sowing wheat. 



1825. The injury from disease less on the wheat than on the corn of 

 the last year on the latest marling, and none perceptible on the oldest appli- 

 cation. This scourging rotation of three grain crops in four years was 

 particularly improper on marled land, and the more so on account of its 

 poverty. 



1826. White clover had been sown thickly over forty-five acres, in- 

 cluding this part, on the wheat, in January, 1825. In the spring of 1826, 



