28 BULLETIN 140, U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 



are to be seen, the milk in excess of the local demand being shipped 

 to Boston. Both Williamstown and North Adams are good local 

 markets for considerable amounts of milk, cream, some butter, and 

 much garden produce. There are few orchards, though good orchard 

 soils occur on some of the local elevations. 



The Upper Hoosac Valley towards Cheshire is narrow, being in 

 places little more than a defile between Mount Graylock and the 

 Hoosic Range. This is a general farming district. The valley 

 closes in on the south with the low hills forming the divide between it 

 and the Housatonic Valley. At Lanesboro the latter broadens and oc- 

 cupies nearly the whole of Pittsfield Town. It then divides, one 

 arm extending south through the towns of Lenox and Stockbridge 

 and the other arm southward through the town of Richmond to 

 West Stockbridge. From the latter town to Housatonic village, 

 mountains nearly close the valley, the spaces between them being 

 occupied by narrow stream beds. 



A few miles south of Great Barrington the valley is again nearly 

 5 miles broad, and thence it extends south to the Connecticut line, 

 including a large part of the towns of Egremont and Sheffield in 

 Massachusetts and of North Canaan, Eastern Salisbury, and Western 

 Sharon, in Connecticut. The valley floor near the Connecticut line 

 is about 700 feet, and at Pittsfield, Mass., about 1,000 feet above sea 

 level. The Berkshire Valley is underlain by limestone and. although 

 the surface soils are glacial deposits, sufficient limestone debris has 

 entered into their composition to render them somewhat more pro- 

 ductive than they would otherwise be. They constitute the Dover 

 series, and vary greatly. Areas of well-drained loams and some 

 light clay loams are interspersed with more sandy soils. Some of the 

 latter are susceptible to drought and general crops are not considered 

 very safe, but the heavier soils are sufficiently retentive of moisture 

 to constitute excellent grass lands. In some cases, to an extent, the 

 soils are cold owing to inadequate drainage, and the crop yields are 

 correspondingly low. Artificial drainage would pay on some of 

 these fields and will undoubtedly be installed in due time. 



The valley walls are generally steep, though herd and there 

 smoother areas open back into the adjoining hills. The hill region 

 east of the valley includes many good farming localities, but gener- 

 ally speaking it is capable of much higher development. From Pitts- 

 field south the valley is walled in on the west by abrupt hills which 

 occupy the northwestern part of the town of Salisbury, Conn., and 

 the towns of Hancock and Mount Washington in the southwest cor- 

 ner of Massachusetts, but farther north they pass out of Massachu- 

 setts and for some distance extend along the New York boundary, 

 leaving room for a considerable area of good agricultural land in 

 the town of Egremont. A representative sample of these good soils 



