A MONTHLY PUBLICATION, DEVOTED TO AGRICULTURE, 
Vol. IV. 
ALBANY, NOVEMBER, 1837. 
No. 9. 
PUBLISHED BY THE N. Y. STATE AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY. 
J. BUEL, Conductor. 
QZP Office No. 3 Washington-street, opposite Congress Hall. 
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state, and within one hundred miles from Albany, out of the state—and one 
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THE CULTIVATOR. 
of the old agricultural society. They were written in 1796, before root 
culture, an important branch of the new husbandry, was practised among 
us. And they rather tend to show the difference between naked fallows 
and fallow crops, in the profits of the farm, than the difference between 
the old and new husbandry. 
“ I will endeavor,” says the Chancellor, “ to state the profit and loss of 
two farmers, each cultivating, besides their meadows, one hundred acres 
of arable land, one in the usual mode of this country, and the other by the 
intervention of vetches and clover. 
Common agriculture 100 acres. Profits per acre. 
20 acres of Indian corn, 35 bushels, at 4s.£7 0 0 
20 oats on corn ground of the preceding year, 20 bushels, at 2s. 2 0 0 
20 summer fallow,. 0 0 0 
20 wheat, 10 bushels, at 8s. 4 0 0 
20 wheat stubble in pasture, . 0 2 0 
TO IMPROVE THE SOIL AND THE MIND. 
THE PROFITS OF THE OLD AND THE NEW HUSBANDRY 
CONTRASTED. 
By the old husbandry, we mean ihe prevailing system of the country, 
which is progressively deteriorating our lands, lessening their products, 
and driving our farmers to the west—a system which neither makes the 
land dry, nor keeps it rich—and which tills, and mows, and pastures the 
same fields, till the plough land is worn out, the grasses in the meadow 
land run out, and the pastures overgrown with bushes, noisome weeds 
and mosses. We call it the exhausting system—for it not only ex¬ 
hausts the soil, but the purse of the cultivator. 
By the new husbandry, we mean the system which has enriched Great 
Britain, and which is now enriching every district of our country where 
it has been fully adopted—the system of draining, manuring, alternating 
of clover and roots with grain, &c. and of blending cattle with grain hus¬ 
bandry. We call this the augmenting system—because it augments, 
or at least preserves, the fertility of the soil, and secures the profits of ag¬ 
ricultural labor. 
The first business of clearing new farms, is almost necessarily exhaust¬ 
ing; because a virgin soil seldom receives manures, and Because the far¬ 
mer has but little leisure to apply them^ or room to alternate his crops. 
Necessity is then the supreme law; but it does not continue to be so af¬ 
ter the farm is cleared up and well stocked. Yet the pioneer habit be¬ 
comes so established by usage, as to be persisted in long after the neces¬ 
sity of the practice of it has ceased. The deterioration is so impercepti¬ 
ble to Ihe cultivator, and his reasoning upon the matter so superficial*, that 
his farm becomes worn out before he is aware of it, or thinks of adopting 
means of renovating its fertility. In this way most of the lands upon the 
seaboard, and in the old settled states, were impoverished, until necessi¬ 
ty, which first induced.the exhausting system, led to the introduction of 
a better one—the system of augmentation 
The new system of husbandry obtained a partial footing among us some 
forty years ago, through the intelligence and enterprise of distinguished 
individuals in Pennsylvania, New-York, and Massachusetts, who esta¬ 
blished agricultural societies in these states, and devoted Iheir time and 
talents to promote agricultural improvements. In the neighborhoods of 
the capitals of these states, agricultural improvement has continued to 
progress, and has spread more or less to different parts of the union;' and 
where it has obtained a footing, it has produced a remarkable change in 
the pecuniary, moral and intellectual condition of society. 
The leading principles in the new system are, as we have already hint¬ 
ed, draining, manuring, alternating crops, the culture of roots and artifi¬ 
cial grasses, the substitution of fallow crops for naked fallows, the applica¬ 
tion of marl, lime and other earthy matters, to improve the mechanical 
texture and the fertility of the soil, and the blending of tillage and grass 
husbandry—of cattle and grain. It is affirmed by intelligent practical men, 
that under this system, more cattle can be fed and fattened, upon the 
roots and straw of the tillage land, than can be fed and fattened upon a 
like number of acres, kept permanently in meadow and pasture, leaving 
the grain as extra nett profit. The new system prevailed long in Flanders, 
ere it was introduced into Great Britain; and it is perhaps no where now 
carried to higher perfection than in Scotland. The Scotch excel in their 
system of draining, and* are perhaps behind few in the improvement of 
their stock, and judicious alternation of their crops. Grass grounds are 
there almost invariably broken up the second or third year after seeding. 
In contrasting the profits of the old and new husbandry, we shall avail 
ourselves, in the first instance, of the practice and calculations of the late 
Chancellor Livingston, as recorded in the first volume of the transactions 
NO. 9 —VOL. IV. 
100 acres. Five years yield per acre,.£13 2 0 
Expenses per acre for five years. 
Indian corn, ploughing, &c.£2 0 0 
Oats, twice ploughed,. 10 0 
Harrowing, and seed, and sowing and harvesting, .0140 
Summer fallow,... 1 10 0 
Wheat seed and harvesting,. 1 0 0 
Rent on five acres, at 4s. a year. 1 0 0 
-7 4 0 
Balance of profit on one acre in 5 years, or 5 acres one year, . £5 18 0 
Profit on farming by intervention of fallow crops instead of fallowing. 
20 acres Indian corn,. £7 0 0 
20 do. vetches, 25 cwt. at 2s. 6d . 3 2 6 
20 do. wheat, 12 bushels,. 4 16 0 
20 do. clover, 25 cwt. 2 s. 6d . 3 2 6 
20 do. the same,. 3 2 6 
Five years produce of one acre,.£21 3 6 
Expenses. 
Indian corn.£2 0 0 
Ploughing corn ground for vetches,. 0 10 0 
Seed 3 bushels and sowing, &c. 0 12 0 
Cutting and making hay,. 0 8 0 
Vetch stubble ploughed once for wheat, seed and 
harvesting,. 1 10 0 
12 lbs. clover seed and sowing,. 0 15 0 
Mowing clover paid by the second crop,. 0 0 0 
Rent 20s. or 4s. a year. 1 0 0 
-6 15 0 
To balance of profit per acre in five years, or *on five acres in 
one,.£14 8 6 
“Thus while one farmer makes £1.3.5 a year, per acre, upon his hun¬ 
dred acres, clear of expense,-the other makes £2.17.5—the one gets lit¬ 
tle better than one hundred, while the other gets nearly three hundred a 
year. In the above statement I have given one farmer credit for two bu¬ 
shels of wheat more than the other, since I am persuaded the vetch crop 
will improve the ground more than the difference, as the dung given to 
the corn will not be exhausted by the intervention of an oat crop before 
the wheat is sown. To this profit should also be added the continued im- 
.provement of the crop by the one mode of husbandry, and the continued 
decrease by the exhausting the land in the other. 
“ The fallow farmer has no fodder which the rotation farmer does not 
possess, except the straw of his oats, which we will value at half a ton of 
hay per acre. He then has from his oats on 20 acres, ten tons. 
The fallow crop farmer from 20 acres vetches,.25 tons. 
From 40 acres clover,. 50 do. 
75 
Deduct the oat straw,... 10 
Superiority of fallow crop farmer,. 65 tons. 
“ He can thus winter, at one ton a head, 65 head of cattle more than 
the fallowing farmer, and as each of these will afford at least six loads 
of dung, he will be able to carry out 390 loads of dung more than the fallow¬ 
ing farmer, besides that he has one exhausting crop less. It will be easy 
to see what difference this must make in a few years in the produce of a 
farm, and how much more it would be than I have rated it at. We often 
