


ps) ee 

SOILS OF SOUTHERN NEW JERSEY AND ‘THEIR USES. Da 
It is probable that the grain crops would have been recorded in 
considerably greater area if the survey had been made earlier in the 
year, since rye is very commonly grown as a winter cover crop, either 
to be turned under as a green manure or to be cut as a forage crop. 
In general the small grains are neither suited to production upon the 
soils of this locality nor able to compete in acreage value with the 
truck crops, corn, or alfalfa, so that the area of the more sandy soils 
devoted to them is small. 
The section immediately around Swedesboro furnishes a sharp 
contrast in this respect to the soils in the vicinity of Woodstown. In 
that locality the Sassafras loam and sandy loam predominate and 

Fig. 27.—Cultivating asparagus on the Sassafras coarse sandy loam, near Swedesboro, N. J. 
the small grains, chiefly wheat, are extensively and profitably grown. 
The influence of the soil upon the character of cropping is clear. 
The Sassafras coarse sandy loam dominates the area, forming 37.5 
per cent of the acreage tabulated. In consequence the crop occupa- 
tion of this type does not differ materially from that shown by the 
percentages for the entire area. The wide use of this soil for grow- 
ing a variety of truck crops is demonstrated by the fact that 10 
different crops are encountered on the type and that truck crops 
occupy 53.5 per cent of its entire cropped area. A slight preference 
for this type for asparagus culture is shown. (Fig. 27.) The de- 
sirability of this soil for truck-crop production is well shown by the 
fact that more than 96 per cent of its area is used for some form of 
cropping, while truck crops occupy a greater area than all other 
