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CHAPTER XIV. 



Depreciated Value of Clay Lands How to maintain Live Stock on Clay Soils 

 Catch Cropping a Matter of Situation Soil and Climate The 

 Theory of Rotations Clover Sickness Practical Advantages of Rotations 

 Purifying Effect on Land for Sheep Advantages of Light Soil Laying 

 Land down to Grass Its Difficulties Its Expense Its Tediousness 

 How best to Bridge over these Difficulties. 



OF all classes of soils, the heavy lands have suffered the 

 most during the great depression which hangs over British 

 agriculture, and the reasons for this are first, because corn is 

 the staple production of arable land of clayey character. We 

 know that the value of corn crops has gone down to an 

 extent which must be looked upon as a great national mis- 

 fortune. It is not many years since good farmers on clay 

 lands could look to the realization of 12 to 13 per acre on 

 their corn crops, and if we were to place the figure at 7 or 

 8 per acre at the present time we should be quite as near 

 the actual value. While there has been this tremendous 

 depression in the value of the staple product of clay land 

 there has been no adequate diminution in the cost of pro- 

 duction. In the next place, clay lands are critical to work, 

 and in the run of wet seasons, which we may consider 

 as now ended, but which ushered in the unfortunate decad- 

 ence of agriculture now apparent, clay lands suffered greatly 

 from want of proper cultivation. Another reason why 

 clay land farmers have suffered has been that they have 



