404 



Improvement of Peaty Ground. 



applied with success for some years by Mr. Williams, at Back- 

 land, on a light blowing sand, as it is called^ as it seems to 

 answer equally well upon peaty ground. In the common North- 

 umberland system of growing turnips it is well known that the 

 ground, when sufficiently ploughed, is thrown up into alternate 

 ridge and furrow with the double-breasted plough, that the dung 

 is placed in the furrows, the ridges split, so that what was furrow 

 before now becomes ridge, and the turnips drilled upon this 

 new ridge standing, of course, over the hollow earth which has 

 been filled into the furrow. But upon a very light sand Mr. 

 Williams, thinking it desirable to keep the ground firm under the 

 root, whether turnip or mangold-wurzel, proceeds in this way : — - 

 The ground is ploughed first very shallow — upon peat it may be 

 merely scarified; the dung is then spread upon the land, the double- 

 breasted plough is used, as in the common mode, to throw up ridges ; 

 but the process is now complete, and the turnips are drilled at once 

 on these first- formed ridges, so that, while the dung is collected 

 round them as in regular ridging, they have a solid bed to stand 

 on in this bastard-ridging, as it may be called ; and I must say 

 that a trial I have this year made of this method with swedes 

 upon peat has confirmed Mr. Williams's experience upon sand. 

 This operation, however, which I have mentioned in order to 

 show the leading principle acted on here by farmers in the culti- 

 vation of peat — tightness of ground — applies to a later crop of 

 swedes : at least in the first crop no dung could be required, the 

 ashes being amply sufficient. 



Rape or swedes being established as the first crop, after the 

 breaking up of peaty land, in the system I am describing, the 

 next crop is usually oats : they are drilled in upon a very shallow 

 furrow, with plenty of seed, and well pressed with a press-roll as 

 well before they are come up as afterwards, in order to guard against 

 the wireworm, the enemy to be feared on such land. It is re- 

 markable that by very late sowing, as late as the end of April or 

 beginning of May, you may be almost certain to escape the wire- 

 worm — it is supposed, because the oat grows more rapidly out of 

 their reach ; but on the other hand it will be harvested late ; and 

 there is this further disadvantage, that the grain, which is always 

 light on such land, will become so much lighter that you perhaps 

 lose in weight as much as you gain in quantity. I may observe that 

 the oats do not ripen together upon this ground: the farmers cut 

 them while they are partially green, because they find that, if they 

 wait until the whole crop has changed its colour, the best grains, 

 which are those that first ripen, shed in the mowing «nd carrying, 

 whereas these are preserved by early cutting, while the unripe 

 grains and green stalks improve the straw as fodder for cattle. 



