Horse-hoeing husbandry : $b or, an essay on the principles of vegetation and tillage. Designed to introduce a new method of culture; whereby the produce of land will be increased, and the usual expence lessened. Together with accurate descriptions and cuts of the instruments employed in it.Tull, Jethro
Science
Horse-hoeing husbandry : $b or, an essay on the principles of vegetation and tillage. Designed to introduce a new method of culture; whereby the produce of land will be increased, and the usual expence lessened. Together with accurate descriptions and cuts of the instruments employed in it.
Tull, Jethro
Agriculture -- Early works to 1800; Plows; Tillage
What induces me to propose this Improvement is, that a Gentleman
plows up his Barley-Stubble, and transplants Turneps therein, and
Hand-hoes them with Success. By the proposed Way all the Expence
of transplanting (which must be considerable) will be saved; and
the setting out cannot be more than an Eighth of the Labour of
_Hand-hoeings_; and I conjecture the Horse-hoed Turneps may be as
good; for they (though stinted) having their Tap-roots remaining
unmoved below the Staple of the Land, their horizontal Roots, being
supply’d with Moisture from the Tap-roots, immediately take hold of
the fresh-plowed Earth, as soon as ’tis turned back to them; whereas
the transplanted, having their Tap-roots broken off, and their
Horizontal Roots crumpled in the Holes wherein they are set, must
lose Time, and be in Danger of dying with Thirst, if the Weather
proves dry.
Also this Way seems better than the common Practice of sowing Turneps
upon once plowing after Wheat; because the Wheat-land commonly
lies longer unplow’d by Six or Eight Months than Barley-land; and
therefore cannot be in so good Tilth for Turneps as Barley-land may,
unless the former be of a more friable Nature, or much more dunged,
than the latter. Besides, these Wheat-Turneps are uncertain, in
Respect of the Fly that often destroys them at their first coming up;
which Misfortune happened the Autumn 1734 to almost all that were
sown in that Manner.
I have observ’d, that Barley sown on the Level, and not hoed,
overcomes the Turneps that come up amongst it; but that Turneps,
which come up in the Partitions of Treble Rows of my Ridges of
Horse-hoed Barley, grew so vigorously as to overcome the Barley. And
this was demonstrated at Harvest in a long Field, one Side of which
had borne Turnep-seed, and the drilled Ridges of Barley crossing the
Middle of it; and both Ends of the Field having Barley sown on the
Level, one End of every Ridge cross’d the Turnep-seed Part of the
Field for about Ten Perches of their Length.
I observed also, that the Turneps near the Edges of the Lands of sown
Barley, adjoining to the hoed Intervals, grew large, but not so large
as those in the Partitions on the Ridges, their Intervals being hoed
on each Side of them.
But different from this have I seen shattered Turnep-seed coming up
in the like Partitions of drilled Wheat, on the very same Sort of
Land, so miserably poor and stinted, that they scarce grew a Hand’s
Breadth high, when those Turneps which the Hoe left in the Sides of
the Intervals, and at the narrow Edges of the unhoed Earth of the
Interval Sides of the Rows of Wheat, grew large; and the Wheat was
good also: But I do not remember how the middle Row of it succeeded.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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