The Clifton Park System Defined. 35 



Another advantage was also found from using much 

 cocksfoot and strong-rooting plants, and which is that 

 the couch grasses were almost extinguished, and this, 

 of course, cheapened the cost of cultivation when the 

 land was again brought under plough. Lastly, it may 

 be observed that from an experiment in a field on the 

 low-lying land on this property, I have reason to surmise 

 that chicory and bumet, if used in sufficient quantity 

 (which they were not in my first experiments), are 

 instrumental in lessening moss, or even of almost 

 entirely preventing its appearance, though it is difficult 

 to determine how much this effect is caused by the 

 aeration of the soil which is effected by the strong and 

 deep roots of these plants, or by their causing the 

 ground to be more quickly and completely covered, or 

 by both. 



So far as I am personally concerned, then, I have 

 solved the problem as regards cultivating poor lands 

 without the aid of any manure, and have solved it to 

 the extent of growing, on the poorest land, crops as 

 good, and indeed, I may say, much better, than those 

 commonly grown on the best land ; and I have done 

 this, too, after leaving the land only four years in 

 grass, and on a system which is continually improving 

 the fertility of the soil, and increasing the depth available 

 for the roots of plants. In the Big Haugh field some 

 drills of turnips were sown without any manure in 1901 

 and 1903, and answered so well that I sowed a whole 

 field without any manure in 1904 (vide Appendix III.). 

 The system, as the reader will have seen, is an extremely 

 simple one. It consists of creating, with the agency of 

 large-rooting and deep-rooting plants, a good sod, and 

 then relying on it for the manurial (except the turnip 

 manure) and physical conditions necessary for growing 

 two green and two cereal crops, after which the land 

 is again laid down to grass, and the creation of a good 

 sod again commenced. But I must warn the reader, as 

 I have elsewhere done, that this cannot be effected with 



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