ROTATION OF CROPS. 



ROTATION OF CROPS. 



ing (or more improving, if much attention is 

 paid to manuring) than the ordinary three-shift 

 rotation. Except in the chance-made addition 

 of the spontaneous bean crop, this rotation 

 offends against every principle and rule which 

 oueltt to govern. 



The three-shift rotation was the next step in 

 the supposed march of agricultural improve- 

 ment, and even yet is that which many remain- 

 ing two-shift or no-shift cultivators aspire to 

 reach, as the limit of their farming and im- 

 proving ambition, and their ne plus ultra of 

 mild cultivation. This was 



1st year, corn 



2d " wheat, and afterwards the sponta- 

 neous grass and weeds grazed 



3.1 pasture, closely grazed. 



The severity of the second year was gene- 

 rally moderated on the poorer parts, by the 

 wheat being there necessarily omitted, which 

 of course gave to those parts two years rest 

 from tillage, in three; and, while the wheat 

 was cr row in IT, a cessation from grazing also. 

 With very few exceptions, such was the gene- 

 ral system of the best cultivated farms in lower 

 Virginia, when Taylor wrote; and it is on this 

 kind of three-shift rotation that his denuncia- 

 tions were so deservedly cast. This rotation 

 violates every sound principle and rule, and 

 certainly deserved to be treated without mercy; 

 but many have continued to denounce the 

 three-shift rotation, even when rendered com- 

 paratively mild, as if the evil was in the num- 

 ier three, and not in circumstances more im- 

 portant than the mere number of shifts. 



Hut. taken in the aspect above described, 

 and which was the best then that was exhibited, 

 the three-shift rotation had no merit whatever. 

 It had no other than fibrous-rooted plants; no 

 other than narrow-leaved crops; no root, legu- 

 minous, or even grass crop; for the close 

 grazing merely served to prevent the soonty 

 la and grass from growing; and while 

 every year's crop was exhausting, the system 

 furnished but small resources and materials 

 f pf manure. For the grazing animals were as 

 many as the land could keep alive, and scarce- 

 ly any were fattened (by grazing alone) for 

 home consumption or market; and their sup- 

 port served to diminish, instead of adding to, 

 the fattening or manuring of the land. At that 

 time it would have been difficult for a reading 

 farmer to comprehend this undoubtedly sound 

 maxim of English writers, "the more cattle 

 kept, the more grain and other crops produced." 

 But the English farmer keeps no animal ex- 

 cept for the profit it will yield; and all that 

 are so kept, give their rich and abundant pro- 

 ducts of manure, as an additional profit to the 

 soil. But when a stock of cattle, sheep, and 

 hogs, can barely make out to keep alive through 

 the year, and never fatten, except by stall and 

 grain feeding, then keeping them certainly 

 yields no clear profit to their owner, and their 

 close grazing of the fields takes away more of 

 fertilizing materials than their dung can pos- 

 sibly replace. An English or French farmer 

 would be no less at a loss to comprehend the 

 object (or even to believe in such a general 

 practice) of keeping a large stock of animals 

 f -i which no net profit was obtained, or even 



hoped for; and he would justly think that it 

 would not be more absurd for a farmer to tend 

 a crop of grain, and then leave it to rot on the 

 field, than to give all his grass through summer 

 to animals, and then lose the flesh so acquired, 

 by starvation through the winter. Indeed, the 

 general cattle management of this country 

 would scarcely be believed in any good grazing 

 or farming region. On the farms under the usual 

 three-shift rotation, say of 400 acres of arable 

 land, there would be from 40 to 60 head of 

 grazing cattle, which furnished annually to the 

 owner, at most, about as much milk and butter 

 as two well-kept cows might supply, one or 

 two passable beeves, with the aid of grain 

 feeding, a few poor calves for veal, and a pretty 

 large supply of hides from deaths by starvation 

 in the spring. There were hogs enough to 

 furnish the year's supply of bacon ; but only 

 by means of grain feeding, which alone was 

 admitted to cost nearly or quite as much as the 

 market price of the meat. A flock of poor 

 sheep were on some farms also, of which, be- 

 fore shearing-time, half the wool of many was 

 hanging on the briers, and the remaining 

 fleeces filled with burs. This sort of grazing 

 system accompanied the old three-shift rota- 

 tion ; and, inveterate as were old habits, and 

 patient as we areof.long-borne grievances, this 

 evil was so great, that none could deny but 

 that the mere expense of the dividing fences, 

 necessary to keep the cattle from the fields of 

 grain, cost more than all the returns from the 

 grazing animals. 



The four-shift rotation, recommended and 

 practised by Col. Taylor, was 



1st year, corn 



2d " wheat, and clover sown or if too* 

 poor for wheat, left at rest, and 

 not grazed 



3d " clover (or weeds), not mown or 

 grazed 



4th " clover, not mown or grazed. 



This rotation, as before stated, was the first 

 introduction of manuring fields by their own 

 vegetable cover, and this practice, and the ad- 

 mission of the opinions on which the new 

 practice was founded, was a prodigious step 

 towards agricultural improvement. It is true 

 that even this rotation is opposed to the rales 

 of good husbandry in most respects. But the 

 giving of two and a half years out of four for 

 vegetables to grow, that were to die and decay 

 on, and be finally ploughed into fhe land, was 

 a feature that compensated for every fault, and 

 made the rotation decidedly meliorating, if on 

 land capable of being enriched by the mere 

 application of vegetable matters. 



In the first of these numbers, it was stated 

 incidentally to other matters why this rotation 

 became of less benefit and more objectionable, 

 in proportion to the time, and to the effect with 

 which it operated ; and if it improved the pro- 

 ductive power of any land, that it also greatly 

 increased the labours of tillage, and the de- 

 struction of products, by increasing weeds and 

 noxious insects. In consequence of this ob- 

 jection, very few disciples of the great intro- 

 ducer of and advocate for this rotation, have 

 continued long to pursue it strictly. 



The four-shift and clover fallow rotation differs 



963 



