CALCAREOUS MANURES— PllACTICE. gg 



CHAPTER V. 



EFFECTS OF CALCAREOUS MANURES ON *' FREE LIGHT LAND." 



Proposition 5— continued. 



Tlie soil known in tliis part of the country by the name of " free light 

 land" has so peculiar a character that it deserves a particular notice. It 

 belongs to the slopes and undulating lands, between the highest ridges ahd 

 the water courses, but has nothing of the durability which slopes of medium 

 fertility sometimes possess. In its wood-land state it would be called rich, 

 and may remain productive for a few crops after being cleared ; but it is ra- 

 pidly exhausted, and, when poor, seems as unimprovable by vegetable ma- 

 nures as the poorest ridge lands. In its virgin state, this soil might be sup- 

 posed to deserve the name of neutral ; but its productive power is so fleeting, 

 and acid growths and qualities so surely follow its exhaustion, that it must 

 be inferred that it is truly an acid soil. 



Experiment 14. 



The subject of this experiment presents soil of this kind with its pecu- 

 liar characters unusually well marked. It is a loamy sandy soil, (the sand 

 coarse,) on a similar sub-soil of considerable depth. The surface waving, 

 almost hilly in some parts. The original growth principally red-oak, 

 hickory, and dogwood, not many pines, and very little whortleberry. Cut 

 down in 1816 and put in corn the next year. The crop was supposed to 

 be twenty-five bushels to the acre. Wheat succeeded, and was still a bet- 

 ter crop for so sandy a soil ; making twelve to fifteen bushels, as it appear- 

 ed standing. After 18 months of rest, and not grazed, the next corn crop, 

 of 1820, was evidently and considei'ably inferior to the first; and the wheat 

 of 1821 (which however was a very bad crop, from too wet a season) could 

 not have been more than five bushels to the acre. In January, 1820, a 

 piece of 1^ acres was limed, at 100 bushels the acre. The lime, being 

 caught by rain before it was spread, formed small lumps of mortar on the 

 land, and produced no benefit on the corn of that year, but could be seen 

 slightly in the wheat of 1821. The land again at rest in 1822 and '23, 

 when it was marled, at 600 bushels, (37 per cent.,) without omitting the 

 limed piece— and all sowed in wheat that fall. In 1824, the wheat was 

 found to be improved by the marl, but neither that, nor the next crop of 1 828, 

 was equal to its earliest product of wheat. The limed part showed injury 

 in 1824, from the quantity of manure, but none since. The field was now 

 under the regular four-shift rotation, and continued to recover; but did 

 not surpass its first crop until 1831, when it brought rather more than 

 thirty bushels of corn to the acre (estimated by the eye,)— being five or six 

 bushels more than its supposed first crop. 



Experiment 15. 



Adjoining this piece, six acres of similar soil were grubbed and belted in 

 August, 1826— marl at 600 to 700 bushels (37 per cent.) spread just before. 

 But few of the trees died until the summer of 1 827. In 1 828, planted in corn ; 

 the crop did not appear heavier than would have been expected if no marl 

 had been applied— but no part had been left without, for comparison. 

 1829, wheat. 1830, at rest, 1831, in corn, and the product supposed to 

 be near or quite thirty-five bushels, or an increase of thirty-five or forty 



