THE GENESEE FARMER. 



comes permanently exhausted and incapable of pro- 

 ducing wheat, by bad cultivation, Mr. R. says : 



" I had frequent opportunities of conversing with 

 Dr. Hall, Geologist to the State of New York. * 

 * * He informed me tliat there are districts in 

 the neighborhood of Albany which formcrl}' ex- 

 ported considerable quantities of wheat, but export 

 little now. He admitted, however, that the soil 

 was similar in character to that of the flats of the 

 St. Lawrence, and also to the flat lands along the 

 east shore of Lake Champlain. But none of these 

 soils were really good originally. I have no belief 

 in land becoming permanently exhausted by fre- 

 quent crops of grain if the soil was naturally good 

 and has not been washed away. There are few or 

 no instances of territories, rich in ancient times, 

 being barren in the present day. A want of secu- 

 rity to the peaceful occupation of a country maj', 

 indeed, convert it into a wilderness, which state, 

 instead of rendering it barren, restores and hus- 

 bands its native strength. By fertile soils, I mean 

 such as are found resting upon our trap formations 

 iu Scotland. There are no soils that I saw in Can- 

 ada at all to be compared in natural fertility to 

 what may be found in Fife or the Lothiaus. The 

 best qualities of our Scottish soils, however much 

 they may be temporarily deteriorated by crops of 

 grain and weeds, are cleaned as well as enriched by 

 lying for a few years in pasturage. The coarse 

 clays on the flats of the St. Lawrence do not sup- 

 port so good grasses for pasture as the thin lime- 

 stone soils in the island of Montreal, and thus their 

 self-restoring powers are comparatively limited. 

 The vegetable deposit, found on the surface when 

 the land was first cleared, being much wasted, the 

 soil has become less friable and less permeable to 

 the air, and all crops now grow less vigorously. 

 The raihvay embankments, formed of the light col- 

 ored clay of the flats, support little vegetation, and 

 the unplowed banks of the rivers have but a thin 

 covering of poor natural grasses — all indicating 

 that the soil was not fertile originally. 



"At one time, the flats of the St. Lawrence pro- 

 duced a considerable quantity of wheat, but in the 

 present day they produce little. About twenty 

 years ago, the wheat midge attacked the crops 

 when in flower to such an extent that the farmers 

 found it more profitable to sow oats. This insect 

 also often destroys the wheat crops both in New 

 Brunswick and Nova Scotia, where spring varieties 

 are only sown. The later that wheat is sown in 

 spring, or rather summer, in Nova Scotia, the less 

 liable it is to the attacks of fly. From the 1st to 

 the 5th .June is the usual period of sowing, but it 

 is sometimes delayed until the 10th. 



" Previous to 1834, the common system that the 

 Canadian farmers followed on the flats of the St. 

 Lawrence was to sow wheat every other year on 

 the same land, without any other preparation than 

 plowing once in autumn and sowing the seed in 

 spring. No artificial grasses were sown for pastur- 

 age, and the cattle merely picked up those grasses 

 and weeds that came up naturally. In many parts 

 the same miserable system is still pursued, only 

 oats or barley is substituted for wheat. 



" It is worth bearing in mind that autumn-sown 

 wheat was never raised with advantage on the clay 

 loams of Lower Canada, Nova Scotia, or New 

 Branswiok. If the crop withstood the frost in 



spring, it was generally destroyed with rust and 

 mildew in summer. I saw little or no autumn- 

 sown wheat around Cobourg or Kingston, in the 

 eastern parts of Canada West, where the clay soila 

 are richer than those of the flats of the St. Law- 

 rence ; but in driving over the country from By- 

 town, on the Ottawa, to Prescott, on the St. Law- 

 rence, wherever the soil was light and sandy, 

 autumn wheat was the principal crop. The soils 

 of Lower Canada seem to be unsuitable for autumn 

 wheat, and the same class of soils is so, to a greater 

 or less extent, over the most part of North Amer- 

 ica. Dr. Hall informed me that there were dis- 

 tricts in Ohio which would be better fitted for 

 growing wheat after they were cropped for some 

 time with Indian corn. In their present state they 

 are too soft, in consequence of the vegetable matter 

 that they contain, for wheat ripening upon them, 

 without being liable to the attacks of mildew. I 

 had afterwards many opportunities of verifying 

 this opinion in Ohio as well as in other western 

 States. The hot and moist nature of the summer 

 climate of North America renders the autumn vari- 

 eties of wheat very liable to disease, and particu- 

 larly so on soils that have any tendency to encour- 

 age grossness in the plant. Hence the physical 

 nature of soils has a much greater influence in 

 America on the gi'owth of wheat than it has in our 

 own cool and less forcing climate, iu which it can 

 be raised on all varieties, with the exception, per- 

 haps, of peaty soils. 



" I learned that the wheat soils only occupy a 

 small area in Nova Scotia and New Brunswick; 

 that even on the best farms there is rarely more 

 than one-tenth of the arable land sown with this 

 cereal, and almost every form has a considerable 

 extent of outfield that is allowed to remain in pas- 

 ture. There is little prospect, in the meantime, of 

 these provinces being able to supply themselves 

 with wheat." 



Ohio. — "The natural yield of wheat is not so 

 large in Southern Ohio as in Canada West and the 

 Northern States, but the smaller yield is obtained 

 at less expense, I was quite astonished at the easy 

 way in which wheat is got in the neighborhood of 

 West Liberty, and I afterwards learned that the 

 same system is followed in all those districts in 

 which the Dent corn is cultivated. The wheat 

 which was sown after the Indian corn was already 

 (Oct. 21) beautifully green, though not quite so 

 forward as what had been sown after clover, but 

 the crop of Indian corn was still standing in round 

 "shucks," in the field. The corn had been cut, 

 and put up in rows in these shucks, which were 

 about three feet in diameter at the bottom, and, 

 tapering to the top, were tied with pieces of the 

 stalks. In this State, the Indian corn is secure 

 from the influence of the weather, and might stand 

 uninjured till spring, as the cob is completely pro- 

 tected by its sheath. In many instances, the fields 

 upon which the Indian corn was thus standing had 

 only got some harrowing to prepare it for the 

 wheat, which had been either drilled or sown 

 broadcast, and again harrowed to cover it, and the 

 stubble of the Indian corn was seen over the fields 

 from six to eight inches in height. By this system, 

 the wheat is got early into the ground in autumn 

 — a condition essential to its successful cultivation 

 throughout America. The Indian corn is removed 



