THE DISTRIBUTION OF FERTILIZERS 201 



British Isles. All the damper parts of the British Isles are 

 specially adapted to the growth of forage crops, although the 

 development of full crops of these materials is only possible 

 with very liberal allowances of artificial manures. Cereals 

 attain their best results, both in quality and quantity, on 

 the drier eastern shores, although occasional droughts are 

 only rendered harmless by the judicious use of stimulating 

 nitrogenous fertilizers. It is in the warmer and sunnier 

 parts of the southern counties that clover plants flourish 

 to their greatest extent, but the sturdiness of some varieties, 

 such as wild white clover, have enabled the northern 

 counties to obtain comparable results. 



The influence of soil is only second to that of climate. 

 Freshly reclaimed peat soils are suitable only to a few crops, 

 such as oats, potatoes, cabbages and rye grass. Newly 

 ploughed up land of a black humus character has also similar 

 limitations, and great care should be taken in ploughing up 

 old grass land, partly because of the large amount of organic 

 matter contained and partly owing to the difficulty of inducing 

 the soil to settle down. A stiff clay, free from excessive 

 amounts of humus, behaves better, and wheat, beans, cab- 

 bages and mangolds do well on this type of land, but on the 

 heavy clays carrots and barley are very difficult to grow, 

 while potatoes and turnips can only be obtained by much 

 cultivation and manure. Loam soils have the advantage of 

 being adapted to the cultivation of all crops ; it is only on 

 these types of land that a rigid adoption of any definite 

 system of rotation can safely be pursued. The chalk soils 

 of the Downs give poor yields of oats, potatoes and grass, but 

 clover, peas, vetches and other leguminous plants give good 

 returns on such soils. 



Demand and market price take precedence over almost 

 all other considerations in deciding the system of farming 

 to be adopted. In certain favourable situations, where 

 there is a nourishing industrial market and a soil of naturally 

 good character situated over limestone strata, very high 

 rents are obtained. Even 5 per acre may be a fair rent, 

 if large and heavy crops of early potatoes can be grown year 



