AGRICULTUTE.

Southland Times, Issue 1122, 1 September 1869, Page 3

AGRICULTUTE.

MORE ABOUT ROTATION OF CROP 3. (From the • Melbourne Leader, 1 21 st August) In a recent issue we had occasion to cite a lucid explanation by Dr Voelcker of the manner in which clover repairs the damage that land has sustained by constant cropping with cereals. In this community there are not wanting persons who believe that rotation of crops is a huge mistake, and that the best and most scientific farmer is the man who keeps land to the crop for which he finds it best adapted ; growing wheat or oats perpetually on the same land, but supplying such manures as these crops may require. We have no quarrel with men who thus keep up the fertility of their land ; but, on the coni trary, have entertained, and shall continue to do so, the greatest respect for their honesty in repaying to the land that which they believe to be its due, and for their | indomitable industry displayed in doing the work in the most laborious manner. "When they say, we will continue to manure our land through the dung-cart, and will not change the crop because our landis better adapted for that crop thanfor any other, what shall we reply ? They mean to do their duty, and that is more than many farmers who practise a rotation can be credited with doing or even intending ; the majority adopt the fashionable system because it enables them to extract more of the land, and to continue to do bo for a greater length of time. But some of these opponents of rotation are intemperate, and attribute to those who differ from them ignorance of science and natural laws. It is in vain that we point out the way in which nature bas worked for herself — how, in the forests of North America, trees of one genus are, after a time, succeeded by others of a totally different genus ; or even how land gets sick of clover, and after bearing it for a few years refuses to do so until after a long interval of rest. Will the advocates of the one crop system be good enough to communicate for the benefit of their | fellow-farmers how the manure must be constituted to enable land to bear continuously a clover crop ? Although Dr. Voelcker has discovered how clover benefits the succeeding crop of wheat, and why wheat after clover comes better ' that after any dressing whatever of the matter usually known as manure, he confesses his inability to say what is the element that is so soon exhausted by the clover; he can only imagine that it is a substance existing in small quantities in the soil, and that is slowly formed or set loose during the process of disintegration which Boil undergoes when in contact with the atmosphere. It strikes us, however, as strange that soil becomes clover sick as quickly after a holiday consisting of a great number of years as after an interval of half a dozen. If the indispensable element be one that is slowly evolved during the disintegration of the soil, it is clearly one that does not accumulate there, or land that had not borne clover for several years would continue to carry it longer than land that had been rested only just long enough to enable it again to bear clover. In New Zealand clovers thrive to perfection, but we want information whether the land there carries the crop continuously, or, if not, for how many years. Some well authenticated facts from that country would be interesting to our friends at

home, who are certainly entitled to all the information we can send them. This clover question has becotrie doubly important since Dr. Voelcker has revealed the fact of its being a perfect mine of ammonia, yielding a dressing of several thousand pounds an acre to the land, far more' indeed than the most prodigal farmer would ever dream of applying ; out Dr Voelcker left it, as one of bis hearers said, in a most tantalising state, " for whilst they were told of the great benefit derived to wheat from a good plant of clover unfortunately in Norfolk they could not grow clover at all." Interesting as it is, we must not pursue further this part of our subject, or the object with which we set out will not be accomplished. Rotative cropping, despite all that can be urged against it, is the system beat calculated to maintain the fertility of the land and cause a plethoric condition of the farmer's pocket. What { say our ane-crop friends to the adoption j of a crop such as clover, that will save them the costly and laborious use of the dung cart ? "Will they endeavor to adopt it, or will they still use their own and their horses' strength to no purpose, rather than give up a worthless principle ? In this country the high price of labor, coupled with the decreasing value of farm produce generally, will at no distant day compel economy of the right sort — not mere penny saving, but true economy,! such as will be found in a judicious rotation of crops, aasociaten perhaps with sheep farming. "We have been blamed sometimes for recommending the practice of ploughing down green crops as manure, but it is one that will ultimately become general here, for it is in warm dry climates like ours that it is calculated to be most beneficial. No manure will produce aa good a crop of potatoes as a heavy sole of grass ploughed down over the seed. Nor are we confined to eloversfor wheat :peas have here proved aa valuable in rotattonwith wheat and oats as clovers are said to have been in England ; and had we a Voelcker here, the cause would probably be discovered to be the same. In tbe old country also, when turnips are over-abundant, they are frequently ploughed down as manure, the only objection to the practice being, not that they are inefficient manure, but that they produce too rank a crop of wheat, oats, or barley, as the case may be. Green tares are one of the commonest manures, and they are so because they are most effective. "Whether lucerne and sainfoin possess the same properties as clover, remains to bo determined by experiment, but the former is at all events a valuable crop for feeding off by sheep, or for cutting as green fodder, and we can imagine no better plan of restoring or maintaining the fertility of the land than a lucerne crop judiciously handled would prove. There is no necessity to keep it down for several years ; if sown during this month it will afford several bites for sheep, or cuttings for soiling ; and it might be ploughed down as early in autumn as would enable a wheat crop to be sown. This we suggest, not as being absolutely better than clover, but as being better at this advanced period of the season ; for clover, except in cool localities, ought by this time to be fairly established. But whereever clover will succeed, it should unquestionably be preferred for ploughing down as a green crop, or feeding off by sheep. As science reveals the rationale of the common practices of the farm, the value of rotative cropping will be better understood, and more generally practised, and then too exhaustive cropping will cease to be the rule.