Turnips Taken After Grass. 33 



poor land, to which no manure had been added since 

 the artificials supplied with the turnip crop, I certainly 

 expected that the grass would have much declined in 

 the third year. 



■ The adjacent field (the Outer Kaimrig) of 22 acres 

 did so well, in consequence of the addition of burnet, 

 chicory, etc., that I had determined on leaving it in 

 permanent pasture ; but, moss having made its appear- 

 ance, it was ploughed up at the end of 1895, and cropped 

 with turnips, preparatory to being laid down to grass 

 on the system previously recommended — i.e., taking first 

 a turnip crop, then oats, then turnips, and then laying 

 down with a thin seeding of oats to lie for an indefinite 

 number of years. On ploughing up the turf, it was 

 found to be so thick and strong that I am now inclined 

 to think that it would be better, in the case of land left 

 more than four years in grass, to begin the rotation 

 with rape. When this field, the Outer Kaimrig, was 

 ploughed the second time no difiiculty was experienced, 

 as the land had become so ameliorated by the added 

 vegetable matter of the first turf. We have found no 

 difficulty in taking turnips out of grass in the case of 

 other fields. For later information about the Outer 

 Kaimrig field, vide Appendix III. 



But I have found, from using chicory, burnet, kidney 

 vetch, and a liberal supply of yarrow, that there are 

 other attendant advantages besides that of disintegrating 

 the soil and supplying it with vegetable matter, for all 

 light land is, of course, very liable to suffer from drought, 

 and all these plants resist drought to a wonderful 

 degree. Of this fact I had a remarkable confirmation 

 in 1895, in the case of a large flat field on the margin of 

 a stream (called haugh in Scotland)— a field interspersed 

 at intervals with gravel beds, the grasses in which, 

 of course, are quickly burned up in periods of drought. 

 In that year there was a very severe drought, and, there- 

 fore, an excellent opportunity for testing the value of 

 these plants in dry weather. When the drought was at 



