The Agriculture Revolution

The greatest part of the Agricultural Revolution took place between 1760 and 1830. Crop rotation and fertilizers were a key part in the Agricultural Revolution because they replenished the nutrients in the soil and allowed all of the farmers' land to be planted instead of needing to leave a field empty for a year to renourish the ground.  There were many new plants introduced that helped renourish the land such as turnips and potatoes.

 Jethro Tull (1674-1741) and Lord Townshend popularized the importance of root crops. Tull's most original contributions were the seed drill and horse hoe. The seed drill allowed more of the seed to germinate by planting it below the surface of the ground out of reach of the birds and wind. It also planted them in straight rows instead of just scattered. Townshend was famous for his cultivation of turnips and clover on his estate of Raynham in Norfolk. He introduced the four-course rotation of crops between wheat, turnips, oats or barley, and clover(industrialrevolution).

Robert Bakewell (1725-1795) prospered in the study of stock breeding. Before this, sheep had been valued for wool and cattle for strength. Bakewell designed cattle for food quality and not for wool or working power. He selected his animals, inbred them, recorded his doings, and took care of his stock carefully. He was especially successful with sheep, and before his death there was a vast amount of new knowlage about the breeding of stock animals for food(industrialrvolution).

 In 1826, Patrick Bell, a young Scotch student, was distraught about the hard long labor of reaping the crop on his father's farm, so he decided to fix the problem. "His reaper was pushed by horses; a reel brought the grain against blades which opened and closed like scissors, and a traveling canvas apron deposited the grain at one side." He received a prize from the Highland and Agricultural Society of Edinburgh, and pictures and descriptions of his invention were published. Although there were several models produced they never caught on, but Bell's idea was used in other inventions later on(inventors.about).

These men, along with others, paved the way for advancement in agriculture so that the growing population of people could be sustained.  Also, the farmers were able to produce a lot more and therefore the farms size grew dramaticaly by enclosure. This is even going on today because more and more farmers are geting out of the traid because of new and better tecnology allowing the other farmers to take over there land also. Without these inventions that improved the amount of land a farmer could farm there would have not been enough workers for the factories and therefore no Industrial Revolution.

Sources

Images

http://www.bbc.co.uk/norfolk/your/a-z_norfolk/a-z_jethro.shtml

http://patentpending.blogs.com/photos/uncategorized/capturejethro_wood.jpg

http://www.ingenious.org.uk/media/4.0_SAC/webimages/1030/1/10301019_2.jpg

Text

http://www.ecology.com/archived-links/industrial-revolution/index.html

http://industrialrevolution.sea.ca/innovations.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jethro_Tull_(agriculturist)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Agricultural_Revolution

http://inventors.about.com/library/inventors/blfarm1.htm

Ellis, Elisabeth G., and Anthony Esler. World History. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Person Prentice Hall, 2005.