38 
STATE AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY. 
SOILS. 
The soils of any portion of country are, of course, deter¬ 
mined somewhat by the character of its geological formations. 
Indeed, except where the deposit of diluvium or drift is quite 
universal in extent and very deep, the soils may be predicted, 
in general terms, with very great certainty. In this State, as 
has been already remarked, a great portion of the surface bed 
of the rocks enumerated and described in the first sub-division 
of this Report is covered to a considerable depth with diluvial 
deposits. The classification of the soils is nevertheless based 
upon geological boundaries—the soils of the entire portion 
occupied by limestone formations being calcareous, those of the 
Potsdam Sandstone region, sandy, and those of the Primitive 
or Azoic district, various, though with very little admixture of 
lime. There are, necessarily, modifications here and there, 
growing out of local deposits formed by the washing of streams, 
the wearing down of elevations, and the accumulation of ma¬ 
terial in the lower places; but in the maim, the classification is 
as above. 
Describing them more particularly, and in terms which an¬ 
ticipate somewhat the character and distribution of vegetation? 
the soils of Wisconsin may be designated as the soils of the 
“ opening,” of the prairie, and of the timbered districts — the 
latter being sub-divided into the pine and the hard-wood 
regions. 
The soil of the openings is generally either a mixture, in 
small quantities, of clay and calcareous loam, with a fine sili- 
cious powder or sedimentary deposit,— and is therefore well 
adapted to the growth of wheat and its kindred cereals,— or a 
sandy soil of but little natural productiveness. The soil of the 
prairies is a rich, deep, vegetable mould, of the most product¬ 
ive character; the soil of the heavily timbered, hard-wood 
districts, clay, clay loam and calcareous loam; of the evergreen 
or pine region, the mixed materials of the drift formation with 
the ditritus of the primitive rocks which characterize that por¬ 
tion of the State. 
