342 AGRICULTURAL REPORT. [T747, 748, 749 



747. The surface soil of the Hogbed or Post Oak Prairie is 

 genera' ly of a gray or brownish-gray tint, with numerous small 

 dark brown dots of bog ore (1F387), to the depth of six to ten 

 inches, where it is underlaid by a yellowish subsoil with reddish 

 dots. Both the soil aud subsoil are very heavy and clayey ; in dry 

 seasons they shrink so as to form numerous, and often large (one 

 to three inches wide) cracks in the surface. The next rain causes 

 the edges of these cracks to crumble off into the latter, which in 

 consequence cannot close up afterwards, when the soil receives a 

 thorough wetting. The intervening soil is therefore often com- 

 pelled to bulge upwards, and this, together with the crack, widened 

 by washing and crumbling, imparts to the tracts occupied by this 

 soil, the uneven surface to which they seem to owe their popular name. 

 The extreme "hog-bed" soil, where thus cracked in dry seasons, acquires an 

 almost stony hardness, and cuts with a shining surface ; and a tract plowed in 

 that condition, resembles very much a field of brick-bats. On the other hand, 

 when plowed a little too wet, the result is scarcely better ; hence it is thus far, 

 a very unsafe soil, on which it is exceedingly difficult to obtain a stand of any 

 crop in extreme seasons. It is very inferior for corn, but will produce good 

 crops of cotton when the season is favorable — the stalk being small, but well 

 boiled; the bolls open late. Owing to these difficulties in cultivation, and also 

 to the great scarcity of icater in the " Hog-bed Prairie " districts, they are but 

 very thinly settled. 



748. That the latter inconvenience can, almost beyond a doubt, be obviated 

 by bored wells, I have already stated (If 324, ff.). As to the improvement of the 

 soil itself, all that has been said in general concerning the treatment of heavy 

 soils (U402 1 ., ff.) is applicable to it; while as to the question of its native fer- 

 tility, the following analysis gives some light. 



No. 242. Hog-wallow Prairie Soil, from the level region east of West 

 Tallahala, about three miles from the stream on the Raleigh and Oarlandsville 

 road, N. E. quarter T. 3, 10 E., Smith county. 

 Depth : Six inches. 



Vegetation : Slender Post Oak with tattered tops ; Short-leaf Pine, and here 

 and there a Spanish {"Red") Oak. 



A very heavy clay soil, brownish gray, with minute dark brown dots of bog ore. 

 The air-dried soil lost 6.833 per cent, of water at 400 deg. Fahr., dried at 

 which temperature it consisted of: 



Insoluble Matter 76.758 



Potash 0.525 



Soda 0.190 



Lime 0.424 



Magnesia 0.674 



Brown Oxide of Manganese 0.559 



Peroxide of Iron 4.121* 



Alumina. 10.059 



Phosphoric Acid 0.063 



Sulphuric Acid 0.059 



Organic Matter and Water 5.733 



99.100 

 749. This analysis represents the poorest of this class of soils, which in com- 



**This amount is too small, an accident having happened in its determination 

 — to which, also, the large aggregate loss (0.900) is owing. 



