THE SOUTHERN PLANTER 



195 



switch was readily thrust into any part of it the fol- 

 lowing spring when the corn was planted — in the 

 month of May— to the depth of twenty to twenty-two 

 inches. The crop of wheat which followed the corn 

 was inferior, and he thinks from the same cause. He 

 had previously fallowed a very fine piece of land for 

 turnips, sub-soiled with a coulter and manured — the 

 turnip crop failed from inferior seed, and the land 

 was vastly improved ; but not more, he thinks, than 

 is fairly referable to the manure. Had subsequently 

 sub-soiled with a wing coulter — the wing at the foot 

 of the coulter — about two-thirds of a corn field — the 

 season was so dry that he only made two and a half 

 barrels per acre where he expected to make eight. 

 There was never any difference to be perceived be- 

 tween the sub-soiled and the un-sub-soiled land, 

 each being equally affected by drought. He has 

 made other experiments, and always with the same 

 results, and has never seen in crop or clover the 

 least advantage. It would have taken a very con- 

 siderable one to repay the expenditure of extra la- 

 bor, which was excessive and required a fourth 

 horse — he ploughs three abreast — to relieve the 

 animal that walked in the sub-soiled furrow and 

 sank to the fetlocks at every step. 



7. Col. Philip St. G. Cocke, on his farm in Pow- 

 hatan, on which he resides, sub-soiled a whole field 

 (for corn) except a small strip omitted for compari- 

 son, which was perpendicular to the line of the 

 road, from which, in passing, the ground was fre- 

 quently seen. It was in a winter throughout very 

 favorable for ploughing, so as to give time for this 

 heavy addition to the usual labor. The ploughing 

 was eight inches deep, and the sub-soil breaking 

 six inches deeper, making fourteen inches in all. 

 In the summer there was severe drought, very try- 

 ing to corn generally. But this crop so well with- 

 stood the effects of the drought, that he ascribed 

 the good condition of the corn in part to the sub- 

 soiling operation. Still, there was no difference of 

 appearance, to his frequent slight and superficial 

 observation and comparison, of the adjacent por- 

 tions differently treated as to sub-soiling. He did 

 not however examine very closely all along the lines 

 of junction, so as to note any existing and manifest 

 superiority of the sub-soiled corn. The winter 

 weather was very favorable to the best execution 

 of sub-soiling, and the summer drought for per- 

 mitting its best effect. 



[Remark. That this crop was better enabled to 

 withstand drought by its being throughout deeply 

 ploughed, cannot be questioned. But it is at least 

 doubtful whether any additional remunerating be- 

 nefit was produced to that year's crop by the sub- 

 soiling. — E. R.] 



8. Mr. Edwin G. Booth, of Nottoway, in the win- 

 ter, sub-soiled, to the depth of 12 inches (in both 

 the ploughings,) every alternate broad bed of a 

 low-ground field, which was cultivated that year 

 in corn, next year in oats, followed by timothy and 

 herds-grass. The intermediate beds, at the same 

 time, had received the like ploughing, by good two- 

 horse ploughs, but the sub-soil operation omitted. 

 By a heavy but transient rain-flood raising the 

 " creek" or large stream, the land was overflowed 

 before planting time. But the water subsided and 

 left the land in two hours. He was never able to 

 perceive any difference of growth in any crop, on 

 the beds sub-soiled and those ploughed only. The 

 land was as well drained as is usual with such 

 lands, but not as well as it might and ought to be. 



7 c 



9, 10. Mr. William Boulware, of King & Queen, 

 has sub-soiled well and deeply two different pieces 

 of land, with very different and also remarkable 

 results. One piece, was of land which was subject 

 to suffer from surface water — the surplus rain not 

 being able to sink through the close lower earth. 

 The next crop (corn) after this sub-soiling, was 

 much increased, being apparently more than twice 

 as much as he had ever made from the same land 

 previously. 



The other piece of land was moderately stiff, and 

 of good and deep soil, and had been originally pro- 

 ductive. The ploughing was very deep — the lower 

 three inches of earth turned up to the surface, 

 had never been moved by the rdough before. The 

 ploughing and still deeper sub-soiling were mani- 

 festly injurious to the crop, which was very far infe- 

 rior to any former one. It was so mean, that he wa3 

 led to suspect that the depth of the sub-soiling had 

 reached some poisonous ingredient of the sub-soil, 

 into which the roots now penetrated for the first time. 



11. Mr. Hill Carter of Charles City, attended care- 

 fully to a trial of sub-soil ploughing, on Harding's, 

 the farm of his son, on James river. The land lies 

 high, and clear of any injurious under-water — but 

 liable to suffer from too much rain, owing to the 

 great stiffness of both the soil and sub-soil, which 

 does not permit the surplus rain water to sink by 

 percolation — and to the level surface, which does 

 not permit the free flowing off. The field in ques- 

 tion was in clover, and to be summer-fallowed for 

 wheat. The ploughing was done by three horses, 

 or good mules, to each plough — full seven inches 

 deep, and well executed. A proper and good sub- 

 soil plough, followed in each furrow, cutting six or 

 seven inches deeper, (or thirteen or fourteen in all) 

 and breaking and stirring the sub-soil, but leaving 

 it in its place, as designed by the operation. The 

 sub-soil plough also had three horses, and was 

 more laborious than the upper ploughing — and so 

 much so, that the sub-soil ploughing, instead of 

 being extended, as at first designed, through the 

 whole field, was stopped, after taking in some four 

 or five acres. The ploughing of the remainder of 

 the field was as above stated, seven inches deep. 

 The whole field, for such soil, produced good wheat 

 — about eighteen to twenty bushels to the acre. 

 But no superiority, or difference, could be seen on 

 the portion sub-soiled. 



12. Mr. Richard Irby, of Nottoway, ploughed, 

 for tobacco, about March 1st, a lot of gray gravelly 

 loam, or " homony" soil — with yellow clay sub-soil, 

 mixed with gravel. The land high and dry — one- 

 half was sub-soiled — the ploughing about seven 

 inches, and with the sub-soil ploughing, fully 

 twelve inches. The land afterwards heavily covered 

 with coarse manure. No difference was perceived in 

 the production, either of the tobacco, or the wheat 

 or clover, which followed in succession — and no dif- 

 ference in the labor of the subsequent ploughings. 



13. 14. Mr. William R. Bland, of Nottoway, in 

 winter of 1851-2, ploughed about one-third of a 

 lot, in a strip through the middle, and sub-soiled 

 the same. The remainder of the lot was ploughed 

 in like manner, but the sub-soiling omitted. The 

 ploughing eight inches deep, and the sub-soiling 

 six inches more. The soil, gray loam, on a red clay 

 sub-soil. Land high, rolling surface, and dry. 

 Part of the lot had been an old garden, and very 

 fine garden ground. The first crop, tobacco, fol- 

 lowed by wheat and then clover. No benefit, or other 

 effect caused by the sub-soiling, on either crop. 



The same year, he sub-soiled in like manner a 



