460 Investigations upon the Grow th of Hops. 



skill. This intensive cultivation of the hop crop is a com- 

 paratively modern affair; the description of the management 

 of hops contained in Scot's " Perfite Platform of a Hoppe 

 Garden " (1573), would have been generally applicable thirty 

 years ago, and holds to-day for many of the poorer farms in 

 the backward districts. The great changes, such as the 

 replacement of the old poles by structures of wire and string, 

 the employment of artificial manures, the use of sulphur to 

 combat mould, and of soft soap washes to deal with green 

 fly or " blight," have grown up within the experience of the 

 present generation of hop growers. The result of these 

 changes has been that the average crop per acre has risen ;. 

 during the earlier part of last century the average crop from 

 decade to decade showed little variation, being about 6 cwt. 

 of hops per acre ; this had become 9 cwt. per acre for the 

 decade 1880-90. Another result has been the shrinkage of 

 the acreage under hops towards certain well-defined centres, 

 where soil and climate are perhaps more favourable, and 

 where neighbourhood and intercourse seem to raise the stan- 

 dard ot management. In a Return for 1844 we find hops 

 grown in places like Cornwall, the Isle ot Wight, Lincoln, 

 Cambridge, Northampton, Essex ; nowadays these outlying 

 districts have grubbed their hops. With the exception of 

 four acres in Suffolk, which make an occasional appear- 

 ance in the Returns, the crop is confined to certain 

 districts — the great Kentish garden, which lies along a line 

 drawn from Tonbridge through Maidstone to Rochester and 

 Canterbury ; the Wealden area, which includes Sussex and 

 part of Kent; the Farnham-Petersfield district; and the great 

 West Midland plantation, consisting of parts of Worcester 

 and Hereford, with offshoots into Gloucester and Shropshire. 

 Even in the favoured counties the tendency is seen to draw 

 in towards certain centres ; in the Medway Valley, the Tame 

 Valley, the group of parishes round Sittingbourne andFaver- 

 sham, more hops are being planted, though the total acreage 

 in the county may be decreasing. 



In view of the importance of this crop and the many appli- 

 cations of science involved in so intensive a culture, the 

 South-Eastern Agricultural College was naturally drawn into. 



