ither the one or the other were thought undesirable and a
still greater amount of roughage desired.

On the other hand, there are places where the minimum amount of
roughage is wanted. There are certain sections of the central West
where it is possible to sow oats on corn stubble without plowing and
where occasionally a rotation is practiced of maize, oats and mammoth
clover. The clover is plowed for maize, the oats are disked in upon
the corn stubble and the next year the clover is pastured until about
June 1, when it is allowed to go to seed. In this rotation the only
roughage obtained is the corn stover and the oat straw.

Another result reached by this rotation is that only one-third the
land is plowed annually. In the four-course rotation mentioned above
three-fourths of the land must be plowed, while in the six-course
rotation one-half is plowed each year. In other ways the character of
the rotation modifies the labor. For example, the labor and cost of
harvesting an acre of hay is much less than that of producing,
harvesting and threshing an acre of wheat.

Rotations may often be planned with reference to the main or cash
crop. Thus in the Aroostook (Maine) potato district the rotation is
potatoes, oats and clover. The chief purpose of the oats and clover is
to keep down the blight in potatoes and add through the clover
nitrogen and organic matter to the soil.

A system of cropping that is best when the owner operates the farm may
not be desirable when the farmer is a tenant. When a farm is rented,
the lease should provide that clover or other legumes occur with
sufficient frequency to keep up the supply of nitrogen without the
purchase of a considerable quantity in chemical fertilizers. The lease
should be so drawn as to make it necessary for the tenant to keep live
stock in order to realize the largest profit. The landlord should
provide an equitable proportion of the mineral fertilizers when such
are required.

The provisions of the lease and the character of the rotation will
necessarily vary with circumstances, but the following system of
tenant farming which has been employed for many years in Maryland will
illustrate the principles just stated:

The lease provides for a five-course rotation consisting of maize,
wheat, clover, wheat, clover. The landlord and the tenant share the
maize and wheat equally, but the clover for hay or pasture goes
entirely to the tenant, unless hay is sold, when it is divi