806 
The Farm Prize Competition of 1890. 
all of them are in good repair. The other house is divided into 
two cottages for labourers. 
The soil is mostly heavy, overlying a clay subsoil, and in 
some places a loose rock. The cropping of the land varies 
according to the nature of the soil, the heavy portion being of 
course more frequently planted with wheat, and the lighter 
with barley. In some fields where the soil varies, the kind of 
corn crop is varied also. This year there are 22 acres of 
wheat, 1 8 § of barley, 7 of oats, and 30 of roots. The remainder 
of the arable land is under rotation-grasses of one, two, or 
three years' sowing. The wheat, chiefly Golden Drop or Cam- 
bridge White, is on the whole fairly good, but one field has been 
much thinned by wireworm. Last year one field averaged 40 
bushels per acre. Barley is a promising crop, and one field 
of black oats after three years' lea is a remarkably strong 
one. 
Mr. Ford has not yet had the farm long enough (only five 
years) to get into a regular rotation, and has in a few cases 
had to follow one corn crop by another. This has limited his 
opportunities of clearing the land of his predecessor's legacies. 
Where two crops have succeeded each other, some 3 cwt. of 
artificial manure has been sown for the second crop. One field 
of mangel is after potatoes which followed oats. The potatoes 
got 20 carts of dung and 12 hogsheads of lime per acre, and 
the mangel got 7 cwt. of special manure. Another field of 
mangel is after old lea. This had dung on the grass in 1889, 
then lime, six hogsheads (= three tons) per acre mixed with soil, 
and, in 1890, 7 cwt. of dissolved bones. The swede crops get 
7 cwt. dissolved bones and mineral phosphate per acre, and in 
some cases dung as well at the rate of 10 to 12 cartloads. 
Where dung is used the roots are carted off, but where none is 
used the turnips are fed off by sheep. Some rape is sown 
after wheat and then fed off. The first year's lea is mown, 
and dung applied afterwards, as Mr. Ford finds the succeeding 
grass crops are better under this plan than where the 
dung is applied for the first mowing. The land does not 
take very kindly to grass, though where lime has been re- 
cently applied the clovers and grasses hold much longer and 
better. 
Most of the pasture land has only been recently laid down. 
There are two water meadows which are irrigated a week at a 
time — betweenMichaelmasand Ladyday — with water from apqnd 
in the yard, through which a small stream runs, and which re- 
ceives all the drainage of the yards and buildings. The wator- 
carriers are well laid out, and extended to as high a level as 
