12 FIELD OPERATIONS OF THE BUREAU OF SOILS, 1916. 



be advantageous, as the severe freezing and thawing process which 

 takes place until early spring improves the physical condition of the 

 soils, especially the clayey types. For the most part preparation of 

 the sandy soils for spring or early summer seeding is deferred imtil 

 spring. Small grain is seeded usually in April, potatoes in May or 

 June, and corn in Jime. The small grains sown in the spring 

 mature in late July and early August. Rye is harvested three or four 

 weeks earlier. About the last of Augjjst corn can be cut for ensilage, 

 and the first weeks in September usually find most of it ripened. 

 Potatoes are dug in August and September, or later. 



Improved machinery is largely used in seeding and harvesting 

 crops. Single walking plows and riding gang plows of standard 

 makes are used, drawn by 2 to 6 horse teams. Drills are invariably 

 used in seeding small grain, and in many instances machines are used 

 in planting potatoes. Potato-digging machines requiring 5 or 6 

 horse draft are in use on many farms. Small grains and corn are 

 harvested with binders. AVindmills and gas engines are in common 

 use for pumping water, and small gas engines are sometimes employed 

 in grinding feed. Large traction engines, both of steam and gaso- 

 line power, are kept by some farmers who have grain and clover 

 separators and ensilage cutters. Large draft types of horses are 

 commonly used in plowing and in tillage operations, as traction 

 engines of the ordinary wheel types are not well suited to use on the 

 sandy lands. Caterpillar tractors might prove serviceable on sandy 

 soils as well as on peat lands, but there are only one or two in the 

 county. 



Most of the intertillage of row^ crops, such as potatoes and corn, is 

 done inlate June, July, and early August. For the most part much 

 attention is given to this work, horse-drawn riding cultivators being 

 used to good advantage. Most of the soils seem to have an abund- 

 ance of weed seeds, which sprout and produce a luxuriant growth if 

 given but slight opportunity. Summer fallowing is almost imprac- 

 ticable except on the heavier soils, the sandy types being too much 

 subject to drifting by the wind. Smothering by grass sod and 

 1 borough cultivation seem to be the most promising methods of keep- 

 ing row crops clean. 



Practically all the farmers practice some form of crop rotation 

 in which clover is included. The rotation in most common use may 

 be outlined as follows: A small grain is drilled in in the spring, 

 with clover Or mixed clover and timothy sown either by means of 

 an attachment on the grain drill or put in later with a wheel-harrow 

 seeder or broadcasted by hand. Under normal conditions the grass 

 comes up well in the stubble after late-summer cutting of the small 

 grain. The following season hay is usually cut, and the grass sod 



