26 
BULLETIN 320, U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 
After planting, the cultivation methods are very uniform. When 
the corn is up, the field is usually gone over with the spike-tooth 
harrow or roller and then cultivated three times with a 2-horse 6 or 
8 shovel cultivator (fig. 23). The cultivating is generally level. 
The yellow dent varieties of corn are usually grown. 
Some commercial fertilizer is used and considerable stable manure 
is produced and applied broadcast. Cover crops are seldom grown. 
The most prevalent weeds found in this region are foxtail, rag- 
weed, pigweed, wild carrot, whitetop, and buttonweed. 
SURVEYS IN MERCER COUNTY, N. J. 
The records for Mercer County, X. J., were taken mostly in the 
potato-growing sections south of Trenton. (Table XII.) The soil 
here is principally of a sandy-loam nature, with a clay subsoil. Occa- 
sionally this clay is underlain with gravel. The land is rolling 
enough to afford good natural 
drainage, except in the bottoms, 
where it is necessary to use tile. 
These bottom lands are practi- 
cally all tiled. The country is 
level enough to enable the farm- 
ers to have fields of uniform size 
and shape and to use improved 
machinery to good advantage. 
The county is generally pros- 
perous. Most farmers have good 
houses, good rural schools are 
maintained, and the principal 
roads have been macadamized. 
The soil, being of a porous 
character, is rather low in humus 
content, and responds readily to 
a humus supply of any kind. Large quantities of commercial fer- 
tilizer are used on potatoes and corn and mostly applied in the drill 
before planting. 
The tillage practices and rotations are of a rather definite type in 
this region. Xearly all the farms maintain a rotation of corn one 
year, potatoes one year, rye or wheat one year, and hay one or two 
years. Considerable truck and fruit is grown near Trenton and on 
some farms this furnishes the principal income, but the source of in- 
come on most farms is from potatoes and rye. 
Corn is usually grown on sod land, and about 75 per cent of the 
breaking is done in the spring. Most of the land is then harrowed 
A 2-horse, 8-sliovel cultivator. 
