crop which, in proportion to the total harvest of the country, was of still smaller
proportions, they are now cultivated on a larger area than that occupied by the
rest of the Swedish cereals together, and give a good half of the total grain-
crops of the kingdom, especially if we reckon its share in the meslin-harvest.
The oat-harvests exceeded the needs of the population at an earlier period
than any other kind of grain, and .ever since the beginning of the decade
1820— 30, there has been a surplus for export, which gradually and especially
from the sixties — became very great indeed, but the growth of the
cattle-farming industry led to ever-increasing demands on the oat-harvests, and
since the middle of the eighties the export of oats has been steadily diminishing,
while the imports have risen to such an extent that, from the year 1902, they
have exceeded the exports. _ ,
As regards the extent to which oats are cultivated in different parts 01 the
country, this grain forms, to a certain degree, a contrast to barley, as oats form
the chief crops principally in the south-western part of the country, from Varm-
land to Halland, while they are less predominant in the eastern and northern
Ians. This is the result, in part, of the liking barley has for soils rich m
lime soils which, on the other hand, are less suitable for oats; we have seen
tha t’ this preference of barley for such land is mostly observable in the marly
districts of Gottland, Öland, South-Western and North-Eastern Skäne, and Oster-
göüand. The predominance possessed by oats in other provinces depends especially
on the lesser demands it makes on the character of the soil the region
mentioned above, lying in South-Western Sweden, has, on the whole, a poorer
soil than that of the marl-lands of the eastern Ians (cf. pp. 35 foil.) The smaller
demands made by oats on the percentage of nutritive constituents of the
soil have led to this cereal being -less often cultivated on newly manured ground;
it is generally the last course in the rotation of crops, after the soil, having
produced a succession of other harvests, has lost most of the fertility given to
it by the manure, together with other favourable conditions obtained from
fallowing or by the cultivation of root-crops, in combination with a thorough I
labouring of the ground. Oats, too, grow better than other grains on humous 1
or peat soils that are poor in mineral constituents, and they form the chief crop
on cultivated peat- and moorlands; in consequence of this fact, the cultivation
of oats has greatly increased during the last forty years, simultaneously with
the increase of the moor-area laid under the plough.
As a result of what has just been said, we find that oats are sown the
thickest of all cereals and give, proportionately, the smallest yield of F “ n;
The great amount of oats used for sowing, is, however, if compared with that
of barley so far illusory that one hectoliter of" oats weighs less than 50 kg,
-while the same amount of two-rowed barley weighs about 70 kg, and six-rowed
barley from 60 to 65 kg; 4 hectoliters of sowing oats per hectare, therefore,
are not more than equal to 3'2 hectoliters of ordinary barley. The fact that
the amount of grain used for seed in the north of Sweden is, throughout,
greater than that used in the southern parts of the country is very probably due
to the fact that the seed is not so well covered with soil, as, in that |art
of the country, the seed is sown by hand and not drilled; but the chief reason |
must certainly be that, in the northern parts of Sweden, the sowing seed has
not attained to full maturity, and so does not possess perfect power of germination.
The inferiority of oats in respect to the weight and value of the gram
is made up for, to some extent, by the greater value of the straw, which, as
fodder, is superior to other kinds of straw, and, after hay, forms the most
important roughing for all kinds of cattle. ■ . .
Many different varieties of oats are cultivated, with white, yellow, grej,
light, or dark-brown coloured gram. At an earlier date, dark-brown varieties
predominated in the eastern läns of Sweden, while white sorts were most common
in the western parts of the country, with, exceptionally, grey-grained varieties
in tracts where agriculture had been much neglected (the more distant
parts of Smäland and Halland). Since the "appearance of improved varieties,
chiefly white-grained,.-those sorts have been more generally cultivated in the former
black-oat districts. Of the two chief varieties, as distinguished by the form of
th e panicle, or the all-side and one-sided, or tartarian oats, it is chiefly the
former that is cultivated, as it gives a better grain crop, while the latter, in
consequence of"its profuse development of straw and leaves, is grown mostly
for green fodder. The old country varieties have, of late years, been replaced
by i improved sorts, obtained chiefly from the establishment at Svalöv, such as
th e white or yellow-white probstejer-, ligovo-, "Victory (Sw. seger-), and gold-rain
oats, and the dark-brown Great Mogul varieties.
In comparison with the straw-grain crops spoken of above, the leguminous
cereals — peas, beans and vetchest.B occupy a- more secondary position in Swedish
agriculture, as they also do in that of other countries, and their cultivation
is still decreasing (Table. 10) in spite of the old experience that the cultivation
of leguminous plants increases rather than diminishes the fertility of the soil,
which experience has in our own days been confirmed and explained, and ought to
have led to an increase in the cultivation of these plants. The reason of this
is probably that these plants give a comparatively smaller yield than cereals. As
regards their habitat, it may be said that they are distinctively lime-loving plants
and are therefore chiefly cultivated within the marl districts, such as Östergöt-
land, Bohuslän, Uppland, the country round Lake Siljan and Lake Storsjön in
Jämtland, but on a comparatively smaller scale, in Skäne, Gottland, and Öland,
in spite of the soil of these provinces being rich in lime. The probable cause
of this circumstance, as far as regards Gottland and Öland, is that the soil there
is too light for these plants. Pulse is little cultivated on land poor in lime,
such as in Värmland and in the highlands of Smäland and Västergötland.
Peas and vetches are cultivated both alone and also (and especially) together
with oats and barley, as meslin, over the greater part of the country; beans thrive
best in eoast-distriets ' and arp chiefly cultivated in Bohuslän and the north of
Halland.
Buck yoheat, which was formerly cultivated pretty generally on sand- and
moor-soils in the southern parts of the country, has gradually lost its importance
; and nowadays is chiefly grown on the poorest sand-soils in Skauie.
The p r ic e s o f c e r e a ls in Sweden during the last six or seven decades are
; shown from the general market prices given in Table 21. In general they are
T able 21. Market Trices o f Cereals. Kronor per quintal.1
Annually Wheat Rye Barley Oats Annually Wheat Rye Barley Oats
1836—40 . . . 13-71 11-07 9-86 7-64 1881—85 . . . 15-33 12-37 11-60 9-76
1841—45 . 14*27 12-00 8-99 6-36 1886—90 . . . 12-82 1005 10-06 8-15
1846—50 . . . 13'92 11-25 1004 7'39 1891—00 . . . 13-15 11-50 11-18 9-15
1851—55 . . . 17-75 14-10 12-25 9-65 1901—10 . . . 13-67 12-59 12-30 10 57
1856—60 . 18-26 13-01 1290 10-42
1861—65 . . . 15-76 12-80 11-29 8-95 1911................ 1525 13-35 13-24 11-10
1866—70 . . 18-09 14-65 13-24 10-59 1912................. 15-42 14-20 13-81 11-56
1871—75 . . . 18-73 14-29 13-77 11-54 1913................ 14-52 13-71 1311 10-95
1 1876-80 . . . 17-11. 13*43 13-12 10-99
. The prices given per hectoliter are reduced to weight, calculating that a hectoliter
weighs: of wheat, 77*6 kg; of rye, 71’7 kg; of barley, 65 kg and of oats, 47 kg.
^ 133179. Sweden. II.