Yorkville enquirer. [volume] (Yorkville, S.C.) 1855-2006, 1874-01-15
agricultural department.
ROTATION OF CROPS.


One of the greatest drawbacks to the rapid
and permanent improvement Of the lands Of
Eastern Virginia, (and we may add Of the
South ally.-ED. So. CULT.) is the en-
tire absence of any regular system in the rota-
tion of crops. 1t is by no means uncommon
to see the same crop cultivated upon the same
land year after year, until the elements OF
fertility are comp pletely exhausted, and then
the land is turned out, to grow up in pines
and sassafras. Even where this course is not
adopted, another almost equally exhausting
takes its place. Corn, wheat and oats alter
nate each other, without any intervening fertil-
zing crop, or even year of weeds and rest.
Still another method, and one which those who
practice it, think great improvement on
those heretofore enumerated, is to allow the
land to rest year or two, growing its own
covering of weeds, which are permitted to RI
pen their seeds, to bring trouble and vexation
upon the cultivator Of the succeeding crops.
All these methods are in direct opposition to
improvement, and calculated to impoyersh
The land, or at best, make it difficult and un-
profitable to cultivate. 1t is to the prevail
ancc ofsystems like these, or rather to such
entire neglect Of all system, that we are in
debtcd for the present povcrty-stricken ap-
pearance Of our farms, and the general
and growing disposition to leave the farm
and try our fortune in other avocations.
Many of our best farmers limit their rotation
to four or five shifts, and cultivate from
two-thirds to three.fourths every year, and
this, too, without keeping any considerable
amount Of stock to supply the necessary ma
nure to make those crops good and paying ones.
If for these large, expensive, and very fire.
qucntly unremunerating fields over which the
farmer labors tediously year after year, a
smaller area, we'll prepared and we'll culttiva-
ted, should be substituted, the farmer would
soon find thathis account ofpro6t and loss would
be on the other side of the balance sheet. It
is a difficult matter to lay down rules for rota-
ton adapted to all land. But safe rule will
always be to have at least onehalf the land
in some crop that will improve, rather than
exhaust the soil. Our own preference is to
plant corn upon clover sod, and for our own
land would adopt the following rotation: -
Corn upon clover sod, oats. peas sown imme.
diately after the oats are cut, to be turned under
for wheat in the fall. Clover should be seeded
y
and then to be planted again in corn. We
do not pretend to say that is the best system,
but it is better than no system at all. An
other rotation practiced BY an experienced
and successful farmer, is wheat upon clover
sod, corn, oats seeded to clover, two years
in clover, then wheat seeded again and per-
mitted to remain two years. This gives ]
corn, oats, wheat, and the remaining half
in grass.
1t will require some years of improvement to
enable the poor lands of Eastern Virginia
and North Carolina to produce crop of clo-
yer that will add materially to the fertli-
ty Of the SOIL In the mean time the field
pea will answer every purpose as fertilizer;
will grow upon the poorest soil, and posses
ses the further advantage of requiring only
one season to perfect its growth and yield its
return. The experience of those who have
tried it long cannot fail to convince us that as
a preparation for wheat it is equal, fnot supe-
rior, to clover 1t would be we'll, then, for those
who are prepared to comence course Of
improvement, to give at least one field to the
growth of this crop as a preparation for
wheat.
Most farmers have mnch more open land
than they can cultivate properly, and many
are, from sheer necessity, they think, permit
ting it to grow up in bushes. If the farm,
instead of being permitted to run to waste in
this way, could be put under judicious sys-
tenn of culture, rotation in which green ma
nurng crops occupied the land one.half the
time, the increased fertility would soon add
so greatly to the crops that there would be no
necessity for cultvating large surface to get
the necessary amount Of grain to keep the
farmer going. Land can be more cheaply
improved by plowing under green crops than
by feeding stock to make manure. At least
it requires much less capital to improve that
way than by feeding stock. But if the farm
er is successful, if he improves his land in this
way, the time will soon come when he can
keep stock cheaply; when the keeping of
stock will become, as it we're, a necessity for
his increased crop, and will have so filled his
purse, that he will have surplus to invest,
and he will naturally enough invest in some
thing that will add still more to the fertility
of his land, the increase Of his crops and the
filling of his purse.-Southern Planter and
Farmer.