No. 6. 



How much Lime should be applied to an Acre ? 



181 



it must be bad management that wont keep 

 it so. But I am wandering from my object. 

 Although lime is now universally used, — 

 perhaps I ought to beg pardon of your cor- 

 respondent, J. W. Van Leer, for saying so — 

 yet the manner of using it, and the proper 

 quantity to be applied, are points not so well 

 settled. In England they put on two or 

 three, or four hundred bushels per acre, and 

 apply the larger quantity for the first dress- 

 ing; while here, we think forty or fifty bush- 

 els a good dressing, and increase the quan- 

 tity as the land is made stronger. The 

 following article, from the third part of 

 Johnston's Lectures, holds up some rather 

 novel views to the Pennsylvania farmer, and 

 I think it would not be misplaced or tbund 

 uninteresting in the Cabinet. 



"The quantity of lime which ought to be 

 applied to the land, must vary with its 

 qualiiy, and with the conditions in wliich it 

 is placed! Hence the practice in this re- 

 spect, necessarily varies in every country 

 and in almost every district. But a differ- 

 ence of opinion also prevails among practi- 

 cal men, as to whether that quantity of lime 

 which land of a given kind may require 

 ouffht to be applied in large doses at long- 

 intervals, or in small quantities frequently 

 repeated. The indications of theory in re 

 ference to this point, are clear and simple. 



x\ certain proportion of lime is indispensa' 

 ble in our climate, to the production of the 

 greatest possible fertility. Let us suppose 

 a soil to be wholly destitute of lime — the 

 first step of the improver would be to add to 

 it this indispensable proportion. This would 

 necessarily be a large quantity, and, there- 

 fore, to land limed for the first lime, theory 

 indicates the j^mpriety of adding a large 

 dose. 



Every year, however, a certain variable 

 proportion of the lime is removed from the 

 soil by natural causes. The effect of this 

 removal in a few years, becomes sensibly 

 apixirent in the diminished productiveness 

 of the land. After the lapse of five or six 

 years, during which it has been gradually 

 mixing with the soil, the beneficial effects 

 of the lime are generally the most strikinir; 

 after this they gradually lessen, till at the 

 end of a longer or shorter period, the land 

 reverts to its original condition. To keep 

 land in its best possible slate, therrfore, the 

 natural ivaste ought from, lime to time, to 

 be supplied by the addition of smaller dose 

 of lime at shorter intervals. 



Such is obviously the most natural course 

 of procedure, and he who farms his own es 

 tate, and has therefore no strong inducement 

 to do otherwise, will, on the first breaking 



up of new land, give it a heavy liming, and 

 whether he afterwards retain it in arable 

 culture or lay it down to grass, will at in- 

 tervals of four to six years, give it a new 

 dose of one-fourth to one-eighth of the ori- 

 ginal quantity. But local circumstances and 

 customs interfere in many well-farmed dis- 

 tricts, with this most natural treatment of 

 the soil. In the county of Roxburgh, for 

 example, on entering upon his farm, which 

 he holds on a lease of 19 or 21 years, the 

 tenant begins by liming that portion of his 

 nd which is in fallow, or in preparation for 

 turnips, at the rate of 240 to 300 bushels of 

 quick-lime per acre. A similar liming is 

 given to the other portions as they come 

 into flillow, so that at the end of his first 

 rotation, — four or five years — the whole of 

 his land has been limed at the same rate. 

 He now continues cropping for three or four 

 rotations — 14 to 16 years — when, if he is 

 sure of remaining on his farm, he begins to 

 lime again with the same quantity as before. 

 If he is to quit, however, he takes the best 

 crops he can get, but incurs no flirther out- 

 lay in the addition of lime. His successor 

 follows the same course — begins by expend- 

 ing perhaps £1000 in lime, and before he 

 leaves at the end of his lease, has, by con- 

 tinued cropping, brought back his land near- 

 ly to the same state in which he found it. 



In the district of Kyle and other parts of 

 Ayrshire, again, lime is laid on — often when 

 preparing for the wheat crop, either by 

 ploughing in the second furrow, or by har- 

 rowing in with the seed — at the rate of 40 

 bushels of shells an acre, and this dose is of 

 course repeated every fijur or six years, ac- 

 cording to the length of the rotation. If we 

 consider the probable difference in the soil 

 and climate, the proportion of lime added in 

 the two districts does not materially differ. 

 In Ayrshire, from eight to ten bushels, and 

 in Roxburgh, from ten to twelve bushels, 

 are added for each year.* In both counties, 

 ihowever, many farms may be met with, in 

 which the treatment of the land in this re- 

 spect, difl'ers from that which is generally 

 followed. 



In Flanders, a similar difference in the 

 practice prevails in different districts. In 

 some, the land is limed only once in twelve 

 years; in others, every third, fourth, or sixth 



* Accortlin^,' to General Beatson, (JVeic System qf Cul- 

 tivation, 13'20,) upwards of 100 bushels an acre, at a 

 cost of £7. IPs., used to l)t|applied to tlio clay lands of 

 Sussex— en the fallow, before wheat — every four years 

 This was 25 bushels per acre, for each year. In .such 

 lanils as these. tlK<! saving in the article of lime alone, 

 which would follow a judicious drainage, would be 

 very great. 



