Proportion of Second Crop to First Crop. 207 



The particulars given are : The actual amounts of produce 

 of the first crops, the estimated amounts of the second crops, 

 and the proportion of the second to the first reckoned as 100 ; 

 and at the bottom of the table are stated the averages of the 

 first crops, of the estimated second crops, and the percentage 

 of the second to the first, for the first eight years of the 

 twenty, in every one of which the second crops were fed off by 

 sheep, and their quantities estimated, and for eight subse- 

 quent (though not consecutive) years, in seven of which the 

 second crops were fed and estimated, and in the eighth (the 

 last of the twenty), in which the second crops were cut, 

 removed, and weighed. There are also given the particulars 

 of the produce for the same plots for the three years subse- 

 quent to the first twenty (1876-78). The salient features 

 presented in this numerical summary may now be noticed. 



Although, without manure, the amounts of produce, of 

 both first and second crops, are small, the proportion of second 

 crop to first is greater than under either of the selected 

 manurial conditions ; that is, it is greater where the total 

 removed from the land is comparatively small, and where, 

 especially, the variety of the herbage is the greatest, and 

 where, consequently, the possession by the roots of the upper 

 layers of the soil, and the capabilities of food-collection 

 generally, will be the most varied. 



Next in proportion of second crops to first comes the 

 mineral-manured plot (7). Here again, the crops, though 

 much larger than without manure, are not really large ; but, 

 as without manure, the herbage is complex, and the command 

 by the roots, especially of the upper layers of the soil, will be 

 very varied. 



On plot 9, the first crops average about one-and-a-half 

 times as much as with the mineral manure alone, but the 

 estimated average of the second crops is very nearly the 

 same in the two cases. Thus, with the much more luxuriant 

 growth of first crops under the influence of the ammonia- 

 salts, and the much more simple and almost exclusively 



