Rensselaer Union, Volume 8, Number 3, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 7 October 1875 — Wheat After Wheat. [ARTICLE]

Wheat After Wheat.

On all new land, and everywhere in the wheat-growing sections of this country when first settled, the growing of wheat after wheat was the common practice. This was partly a necessity, for in early days wheat was often the only crop which would bring a cash price, and even now it is almost always the crop that best beam the cost of transportation, owing to its higher price per bushel. For a time this severe cropping did net seem to injure the soil or seriously impair its fertility. There would, occasionally, be a poor crop, but this was attributed to cold or wet or drought, rather than poverty of soil. But it soon began to be noticed that these mjcidents of the season I 'occurred more and more frequently, until finally only with perfect weather throughout could a crop be assured. Of late years, in the older-settied pans of the country, wheat is very rarely grown after wheat, and in many places there is almost f a superstitious objection to this method of cropping. Yet, as successive crops of wheat have been and are grown on new land, it is evident that the difficulty is not the practice itself, but in the londition of the soil. Make the soil riclrenough, and a second or even third crop of wheat may be grown, and the last be as good as the first We have often known the second crop to be better where the first was sown on a newly-turned sod, which will be in much better condition for the second crop than for the first. As for the. exhaustion of fertility, two crops of wheat in succession are certainly no worse than the common rotation of corn or potatoes, followed by oats or barley, and that by wheat. A wheat stubble is n worse than oats or barley, and we incline to think it

rather better, especially if plowed as soon as the crop is harvested. Either way we have two grain crops in succession, and our experience is that wheat is not so exhaustive as oats. We do not advocate sowing wheat after wheat as a general practice, hut there are some occasions when it seems advisable, and others where it may be provided for. If tlie clover catch has entirely failed it is better to plow and je-seed with wheat than to leave the field till spring to be sown with oats or barley, and then with wheat a year later. It is better than to have the field barren a year to fill with weeds, as such fields are sure to do. With a very little manure as topdressing, or some commercial fertilizer drilled in w r ith the seed, wheat after wheat is one of the most certain of crops, and there is an absolute certainty of a good catch of clover. - ' 1 There is one place where twq crops of wheat ought always to be taken, and that is after a heavy growth of clover has been plowed under and the field summer-fal- • lowed.' This preparation is the very- best for wheat; but it is .too costly to be afforded for one crop, and there is a further dis- , Acuity in getting a good growth of clover on such land. Unless the season i? very favorable for clover there will not he half a catch, and in dry seasons the field after harvest will he almost bare. The result, will be that the-next year the weeds will have free course, ana fill the soil with seeds as badly as before it was fallowed. One chief use,of a summer-fallow is to make the land'clear; and where theclover fails this advantage is entirely neutralized. Our way with suoh fields is to not sow clover-seed on a clover ley, for it will be a waste of seed, but turn under the stubble immediately after harvest, fit the land as well as possible and drill in 200 pounds of superphosphate per acre with the wheat, using as much barn-yard manure as topdressing as we can obtain. Next spring seed heavily with clover, and it will grow in such a mat as to. entirely eradicate the weeds. In this way the costly summerfallow is made to give two good crops of wheat and a good catch of clover, rather than one crop of wheat and no seeding. It is easy to see which method is likely to be most profitable. Timothy seed sown in the fall will generally give a good catch on clover sod; but the effects of clover in improving the soil are so important that we prefer to wait a year longer and take a second crop of wheat in order to insure a good growth of clover. —j ßural Few Yorker.