The Russellville Democrat. [volume] (Russellville, Ark.) 1875-1898, 1883-07-26
Rotation Of Crops.


Why does farmer change the crops
Of each field every year, growing first
clover and grass and then corn, then
oats, and lastly, wheat or rye, and
again seeding down to clover and grassP
II is because he knows that these crops
succeed better when thus grown, and
that he can not grow the Same crop
every year on the same ground with
profit. There is good reason for this.
Il is because the nature of each Of these
different crops is not the same that one
seems to rest the soil, that clover ac-
tually leaves the soil better than 1t was
before, besides adding to it in the shape
of roots, stems and leaves, a large guam
tity of valuable plant food for the corn
which follows it ; that the culture of
corn kills vast quantity of weeds,
cleans the ground, and prepares it for
the oats and wheat that after the oats
have been grown the soil has given up
to that crop all the strength it possessed,
and that it then requires help to restore
it. This is given by the manure and
fertilizers used to prepare for the wheat
or rye and the clover and grass after it,
and that by this treatment one can go
on year after year, for whole lifetime,
growing crops. and then leave his farm
still fertile and useful for his children,
who may do the same, to be followed
again by their children.
This method of culture is called the
rotation Of crops, and the usual rota-
ton consists of the four crops men
toned, viz: clover and grass, corn, oats,
and wheat. This is called the four
course system. Some fsrmers add 9TH
or crops and so lengthen the course with
great benefit to the soil; because in the
four-course system there is too much
grain and too little fodder for feeding
cattle and making manure, without
which good crops can not be grown.
There are also not enough of the reno
waiting crops. as those are called in
which either the soil il MANFRED OF
rested and restored, or in fact renewed
in strength and power to produce the
other crops which take more from the
soil, and are therefore called exhaustive.
For the principle at the bottom of this
system Of rotation is chiefly this: That
the farmer must follow an exhaustive
crop with a.renovating one; that is, one
that is hard or difficult to grow with one
that is easy, and SO give the soil an OPP
portunity to recover before its strength
is taxed too much.
Much injury has been done to many
farms by an unwise neglect of this pre-
caution and crops of wheat and corn
have been grown year after year, until
the soil has been made unable to pro-
duce enough to pay the farmer for his
labor, or to support him and his family
with comfort. 1t is in this way that
farms have been worn out and people
have been forced to go further west to
get new land, that the same wasteful
practice may be followed. Now that
the West is becoming filled up and the
best lands are occupied, this can no
longer be done, and farmers are Obliged
to follow more skillful practice and
are forced to study more carefully the
nature of their business that they may
make their farms more productive.
The feeding of cattle and sheepis the
most important part of the farm work,
and the growing of feeding crops there
fore needs to be made special study
by the young farmer Arotation, then,
which can be made to include the lar
gest number of feeding crops, is the
best. A seven-course rotation is some
times practiced in which clover and
grass are grown one year for hay and a
second year for pasture followed by
corn, oats roots (either turnips or man
gels) barley, clover for hay, and wheat
on the clover sod, followed by grass.
This rotation has many advantages. 1t
has two cultivated or cleaning crops.
corn and roots two sods plowed under,
and four feeding crops, viz: corn, roots
and two hay crops. Where it can be
followed it enables the farmer to keep a
flock of sheep or to keep cows and a
dairy which is one of the most profita-
BILE and pleasant parts of farming, and
gives the girls an agreeable opportuni-
ty of adding to the income of the farm
and to their own resources, by making
butter, as we'll as finds employment for
the boys, which is not so laborious as
the constant raising of grain. When
the rotation is chosen, the farm is di-
vided into fields to suit the course, five
for the four-course, in which there are
two in grass at the same time, and eight
for the seven-course rotation. Henry
SteUart, IN Country Gentleman.