JOURNAL 
OF Till': 
ROYAL AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY 
OF ENGLA^^D. 
XII. — Report of the Farm-Prize Competition, 1871. By John 
Wheatley, Nesvvick, Driffield. 
The system of giving prizes for the best-managed farms in tlie 
districts of the country meetings, first originated by Mr. Mason 
last year, is well calculated to illustrate the peculiar practices of 
different districts, which, if properly registered in the 'Journal,' 
would eventuall}' form a collection of valuable facts. At the 
suggestion of Mr. H. W. Kear}', who reported on the Oxford 
competition, the landowners of Shropshire and Staffordshire, 
encouraged the Society to repeat the experiment this year, and 
subscribed the two first prizes of one hundred pounds each for 
the best specimen of arable and dairy farming ; and the Society 
undertook to provide a further sum of one hundred pounds for 
two second prizes of fifty pounds each, to appoint the Judges, 
and to pay all the expenses attending the inspection and awards.* 
In addition to the first prizes, a further sum of fifty pounds was 
placed at the disposal of the Judges by the local subscribers, to 
reward any special feature of excellence in the management of 
any of the competing farms. 
It must be gratifying both to the landowners of the district anl 
to the Society that their efforts were so well supported by the 
farmers, especially in the arable class, in which no less than 
twenty-three entries were made. The dairy-farming, though an 
important interest, and occupying a considerable portion of the 
* The following is a list of the subscribing landowners in Shropshire and 
Staffordshire: — The Duke of Cleveland, the Duke of Sutherland, the Marquis of 
Anglesey, the Earl of Bradford, the Earl Brownlow, the Earl of Dartmouth, the 
Earl Granville, the Earl of Harrowby, the Earl of Lichfield, the Earl of Powis, 
the Earl of Shrewsbury, the Viscount Hill, Lord Actou, Lord Bagot, Lord Berwick, 
Lord Forester, Lord Hatherton, Lord Vernou, Lord Wenlock, Lord Wrottesley, 
W. O. Foster, Esq., H. F. Meynell Ingram, Esq., .1. Piitchard, Esq., the Rev. 
Walter Sneyd, Major Thorneycroft, the Rev. F. W. Whitmore. 
VOL. VIL — S. S. X 
