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BRITISH] as in any one of the years 1890, 1891 and 1898. The produce of barley, like that of oats, is less irregular than that of wheat, the extremes for barley being 80,794,000 bushels (1890) and 62,453,000 bushels (1904), and those for oats 190,863,000 bushels (1894) and 161,175,000 bushels (1901). Similar details for potatoes, roots and hay, brought together in Table VIII., show that the production of potatoes varies much from year to year.

The imports of potatoes into the United Kingdom vary, to some extent inversely; thus, the low production in 1897 was accompanied by an increase of imports from 3,921,205 cwt. in 1897 to 6,751,728 cwt. in 1898. No very great reliance can be placed upon the figures relating to turnips (which include swedes), as these are mostly fed to sheep on the ground, so that the estimates as to yield are necessarily vague. Mangels are probably more closely estimated, as these valuable roots are carted and stored for subsequent use for feeding stock. Under hay are included the produce of clover, sainfoin and rotation grasses, and also that of permanent meadow. The extent to which the annual production of the leading fodder crop may vary is shown in the table by the two consecutive years 1893 and 1894; from only nine million tons in the former year the production rose to upwards of fifteen million tons in the latter, an increase of over 70%.

Turning to the average yields per acre, as ascertained by dividing the number of acres into the total produce, the results of a decade are collected in Table IX.

The effects of a prolonged spring and summer drought, like that of 1893, are exemplified in the circumstance that four corn crops and the two hay crops all registered very low average yields that year, viz. wheat 26·08 bushels, barley 29·30 bushels, oats 38·14 bushels, beans 19·61 bushels, rotation hay 23·55 cwt., permanent hay 20·41 cwt. On the other hand, the season of 1898 was exceptionally favourable to cereals and to hay. The effects of a prolonged autumn drought, as distinguished from spring and summer drought, are shown in the very low yield of turnips in 1899. Mangels are sown earlier and have a longer period of growth than turnips; if they become well established in the summer they are less susceptible to autumn drought. The hay made from clover, sainfoin and grasses under rotation generally gives a bigger average yield than that from permanent grass land. The mean values at the foot of the table-they are not, strictly speaking, exact averages-indicate the average yields per acre in the United Kingdom to be about 31 bushels of wheat, 33 bushels of barley, 40 bushels of oats, 28 bushels of beans, 26 bushels of peas, 4 tons of potatoes, 13 tons of turnips and swedes, 18 tons of mangels, 32 cwt. of hay from temporary grass, and 29 cwt. of hay from permanent grass.

Although enormous single crops of mangels are sometimes grown, amounting occasionally to 100 tons per acre, the general average yield of 18 tons is about 5 tons more than that of turnips and swedes. Again, although from the richest old permanent meadow-lands very heavy crops of hay are taken season after season, the general average yield of permanent grass is about 3 cwt. of hay per acre less than that from clover, sainfoin and grasses under rotation. The general average yields of the corn crops are not fairly comparable one with the other, because they are given by measure and not by weight, whereas the weight per bushel varies considerably. For purposes of comparison it would be much better if the yields of corn crops were estimated in cwt. per acre. This, indeed, is the practice in Ireland, and in order to incorporate the Irish figures with those for Great Britain so as to obtain average values for the United Kingdom, the Irish yields are calculated into bushels at the rate of 60 ℔ to the bushel of wheat, of beans and of peas, 50 ℔ to the bushel of barley and 39 ℔ to the bushel of oats.

The figure denoting the general average yield per acre of any class of crop needs readjustment after every successive harvest. If a decennial period be taken, then—for the purpose of the new calculation—the earliest year is omitted and the latest year added, the number of years continuing at ten. Adopting this course in the case of the cereal crops of Great Britain the decennial averages recorded in Table X. are obtained, the period 1885–1894 being the earliest decade for which the official figures are available. It thus appears that the average yield of wheat in Great Britain, as calculated upon the crops harvested during the ten years (1896–1905), exceeded 31 bushels to the acre, whereas, for the ten years ended 1895, it fell below 29 bushels. A large expansion in the acreage of the wheat crop would probably be attended by a decline in the average yield per acre, for when a