4 {JO
inch, or even less, to two inches or more ; but this circum-stance is probably in no respect material to the success ofthe crop, provided that the seed be sufficiently covered toprotect it from the depredation of birds *. This opinion ispowerfully corroborated and illustrated bv the vigour withwhich shaken wheat, and indeed all other grain, vegetates inthe ensuing year among sown grasses, although not at allcovered by the soil.
§ 7. The kinds —or varieties of wheat cultivated in Scot-land are numerous, yet may all be arranged under two deno-minations, red and white, both belonging to the Lammas orwinter species, called iriticnm liybernum by Linnaeus . Thedifferent sub-varieties of the red wheat are now rarely sownin the best managed districts of Scotland , because they donot bring a price in the market equal to what can be had forwhite wheats f. Wqoly-eared or thick-chaffed wheat hashardly for ten years pas^ been met with ; and when it hap-pens to be mixed «|r blended among other kinds, which isonly to be known when growing, it is considered as a kindof weed, as its woolly husks retain moisture in wet harvests,and occasion it to be more apt, than the smooth-husked va-rieties, to chip or sprout in the ear; a very serious evil to acrop of wheat, as all the grains that are much grown are en-tirely lost, and those which are only chipped, or malted, asit may be called, injure the flour materially, and prevent thebread from rising in the baking process.
The names by which varieties of wheat are known in onedistrict, convey no information whatever in any other place,being altogether arbitrary in their first imposition, and ha-ving perhaps no regularly distinctive marks by which theymay be afterwards known. Of the white wheats there are
* Two inches will secure the grain from the depredations of pigeons, butmore will be required as a protection from the long beaks of rooks.
•J* Brown’s Treatise on Rural AfTairt.