Experiments on University Farm. 459 
The Snow-Flake and Brownell’s Beauty were first raised last 
year. They promise to be very valuable varieties in all respects 
They yield well, are fine looking, and are second to no potatoe in 
quality. 
IMPROVEMENT OF SOILS BY MECHANICAL MEANS. 
This experiment was begun in 1871, upon four adjacent plats of 
an acre each, to be cultivated as follows: 
Plat 1, to be plowed to a depth of five inches only. 
Plat 2, to be plowed twelve inches deep. 
Plat 3, to be plowed twenty inches deep by trench-plowing. 
Plat 4, to be plowed twenty inches deep by subsoiling. 
Plats 1 and 2 have been cultivated in the prescribed manner from 
the beginning. 
Plat 3, in 1871, was plowed twelve inches deep only; in 1872 and 
1873, seventeen inches; in 1874 and 1875, eighteen inches, which is 
as deep as it has been found practicable to plow. 
Plat 4 was subsoiled sixteen inches deep in 1871; seventeen in¬ 
ches in 1872 and 1873, and eighteen inches in 1874 and 1875. 
The cultivation of these plats has been the same in all other re¬ 
spects than those mentioned. 
The soil is clay, with heavy clay-subsoil; the land is level and 
rather low. In the fall of 1873, an underground drain was laid 
through each of the plats, to carry away water that formerly 
flowed over them all, after heavy rains, 
During the first four years these plats were in cultivation to 
corn exclusively. The past season a portion has been in cultivation 
to corn and a portion to oats. The following table gives the yield 
per acre for the respective years, the corn being in bushels of ears, 
weighing 75 pounds each: 
Method of Cultivation. 
1871. 
OD 
t-H 
1873. 
1874. 
1875. 
Corn. 
Oats. 
Plowed 5 inches deep. 
55.4 
43.5 
53.4 
53 
67.7 
60.2 
Plowed 12 inches deep. 
50.6 
50.3 
52.8 
58.1 
67 
65.5 
Trench-plowed 18 inches deep. 
44.9 
54.7 
51.3 
65.3 
60.5 
65.1 
Subsoiled 18 inches deep. 
42.2 
56.8 
51.1 
60.8 
57.2 
64 
The yield of plats 3 and 4 was considerably diminished by the 
chinch-bug, plat 4 being the more injured. How great was the 
