British Agricultural Revolution

The British Agricultural Revolution describes a period of agricultural development in Britain between the 15th century and the end of the 19th century, which saw an epoch-making increase in agricultural productivity and net output that broke the historical food scarcity cycles. Every continent in the world has experienced a period of famine throughout history. These famines effectively limited the population to what a local territories could sustain over long periods of time including short term shortages. Famines occur when food is unavailable for a period of time usually exceeding a year and the resources: weather, agricultural workers, money, transportation, etc. are not available to get or grow more. Since famines or food shortages are usually "local" affairs the ability to buy and transport food over a much longer distances helped minimize the impacts of local crop shortages. The British Agricultural Revolution occurred over a period of several centuries (more of an evolution than a revolution) and it was preceded or closely duplicated by many countries in Europe and their colonies. One of the keys to the British Agricultural Revolution was the development of ways of keeping and improving the arable land in great Britain to counteract the loss of the soil's plant nutrients in cropping a given area. Higher yielding land was added to higher yielding crops with more yield/acre. Farm workers using more productive tools and machinery produced more crops with fewer workers. The Agricultural Revolution picked up speed as the Industrial Revolution and the advances in chemistry produced the scientific knowledge, wealth and technology for a more systematic development of commercial fertilizers and new and more productive agricultural machinery. New crops like potatoes (introduced about 1600), corn, etc. were introduced from the Americas improving the yield/acre of arable land.

Advances that helped the Agriculture revolution

Improved transportation systems like sailing ships, paddle steamers (after 1830), steam ships (after 1860), refrigerator ships (after 1890), toll roads (after 1700), canals (after 1760), railroads (after 1830) allowed food and animal crops to be gathered over ever increasing distances. New food preservation techniques like canning (after 1800), refrigeration (after 1880) as well as traditional food storage techniques like root cellars, granaries, etc. were improved. These allowed more food to be stored over longer periods of time and minimized the impact of local shortages. Ever increasing literacy (spread by the Protestant Reformation among others) and cheap "How-To" books made available by Johannes Gutenberg's invention of the printing press made information on successful new agricultural techniques spread faster and over much wider territories. New technologies like the telegraph (after 1830) and the telephone (after 1880) improved the flow of information needed to ship or grow new crops. New crop rotation systems involving turnips and clover (plus others) made it less necessary to have so much land lie fallow. New crops had more yield per acre and new improved livestock that could be fed though the winters gave larger yields of meat. Larger drives of livestock from Ireland, Wales and Scotland increased the available meat supply available to be purchased in the ever increasing cities. New irrigation systems called water meadows allowed longer growing seasons on pasture land and increased yield from hay fields allowing more animals to be raised. Improved use and new fertilizers in addition to "manure" helped maintain and improve the arable land or reclaim formerly "waste" land. These improvements and new crops in turn supported unprecedented population growth, freeing up a significant percentage of the workforce, and thereby helped drive the Industrial Revolution.

The Bank of England (after 1700) helped the farmers get and use the capital (raised from other investors) needed to buy farm improvements and herds of livestock. A good financial system was needed to put capital investments back into the farms and livestock operations. Since it was much more economical to use a few herders as reasonable to bring herds of livestock the long distances from Ireland, Wales and Scotland to England for fattening and/or slaughter accumulating the money to buy these herds was much facilitated by a workable banking system. The wealth (capital) earned by the workers in the Industrial Revolution in turn allowed these workers to buy and pay for more agricultural farm and livestock production. The Industrial Revolution also made many things much cheaper so the farmers could purchase more extensive wardrobes, metal tools, new machines, etc. with the same earnings. There are large variations in the location and time different agricultural innovations were introduced in the many different agricultural zones in Britain and the rest of the world. Advances in science, engineering and elementary botany encouraged the progression of the Agricultural Revolution in Britain and elsewhere. More professional farm management, more capital investment, better agricultural education, improved fertilizations, new improved crops or higher yield, mechanization of farm work from oxen, horses, steam power and then gasoline or diesel power, four-field crop rotation, and selective breeding of livestock for larger size and other desirable characteristics have been highlighted as important links to the Agricultural revolution.

Increased understanding of the important chemicals need for proper plant nutrition allowed new fertilizers to be imported and made. Eventually the establishment of a chemical fertilizer industry made it possible to restore the chemicals lost in growing crops to maintain the needed enhanced food plant growth.

New agricultural equipment like cultivators, plows, threshers, mowers, combines, balers, etc. were invented and powered by oxen, horses, steam power, then gasoline or diesel as the farm machinery became mechanized and allowed the farmers to become ever more productive. The farm transportation system moved from pack animals to carts and wagons pulled by oxen, to mules or horses to trucks (after about 1915).

As the Industrial Revolution picked up speed in the early 1800s the metal technologies, power sources, metal working skills, monetary systems, capital, etc. became available for agricultural continuation and improvement. Early successes led to ever increasing innovative agricultural machinery and labor saving devices. The percentage of the population in agricultural work decreased from about 80% in the 1300s to less than 2% today (in the developed world) as the agricultural "revolution" continues.

Farm life in the 15th to 18th century

The about 77,800,000 acres (about 31,480,000 hectares) of land in Britain pre-1922 varied considerably in arability. England had about 30% arable land with Wales, Scotland and Ireland favoring raising livestock and dairy farming with only about 3%, 7% and 15% arable land respectively. Nearly all of Britain is less than 75 miles (121 km) from the ocean and many communities have close ties to fishing and trade. Nearly all farmers kept livestock as well as growing crops on arable land for their own food and a small extra amount to trade with the towns people for goods they couldn't or didn't have time to make. The livestock were almost a necessity as they could eat pasture during the day and spread some of their manure over arable or fallow land during the night if a crop was not planted there yet. During the winter when they were fed and housed their manure built up around the stock pens and was usually hauled out in the spring and spread on the grain fields before they were plowed. To help keep the land productive manure or other plant matter had to be spread on the soil by the livestock or the farmer regularly to maintain the plant nutrient levels needed to grow wheat, oats, rye, barley, etc.. Barley was grown primarily to be fed to animals or brewed into beer. The water was so unsafe that beer was a very common beverage drank by nearly all. Oats, rye and wheat were primarily used in cereals and breads.

Nearly all farm and village families kept gardens that grew a wide variety of vegetables that were used when they had ripened or grown large enough. Nearly all farmers kept pigs, which could often scrounge most of their own food or eat milk left over from making cheese, scraps or slop. Most kept chickens which could provide eggs and meat and which could often scrounge much of their food in the summer and only needed to be fed during the winter months. Cows were kept by most farmers for their hides, milk, meat and manure as well as being used as draft animals. Sheep were kept for their hides, milk, meat, manure as well as their wool. Wool was a “money” crop that allowed the wool to be sold for extra money to buy the few things that weren’t produced on the farm. Some wool was often kept to be spun by women on a spinning wheel into thread and then put on a loom to be wove into cloth. Making cloth and clothing was so labor intensive (before the Industrial Revolution) that many farmers only had two to three different sets of clothing per lifetime. The most sheep were usually owned by the largest land owners. Initially horses were scarce, owned only by large land owners, as they required more winter feed and were only slightly more productive as farm animals than oxen which could live on poorer food and be eaten. A horse was seldom eaten by people in Britain.

The main disadvantage of farm animals is that food had to be provided for them during the winters. The winters in Middle age society were always a time of stress where you, your family and your animals had to try and survive on whatever food could be saved through a non growing season. The herds were nearly always cut down by killing or selling many of the livestock and pigeons, chickens, geese, pigs, etc.. The meat was salted and stored in barrels to try and preserve it though the winters and the leather used to make many of the items needed on a farm. Dried grains used for cereals and breads and salted meat were the most common food items in the winter. Fresh milk and cheese were seldom eaten as the cows were often "dried up" to help them get through the winter on poor food. Often by spring nearly everyone was on restricted rations of a very monotonous diet. Early garden vegetables were considered a great treat. A bad storm or lack of rain at the right time could seriously reduce the crops needed for the winter and there was only a limited recourse because of the limited money, time, and transportation facilities. Farmers seldom kept significant grain reserves.

Soil maintenance

Populations (in millions)
Year	Britain	London	Rural	Percent Rural
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1100	1.0-2.0	.01-.02	-	-
1300	3.0-3.8	.02-.05	-	-
1350	4.5-6.0	.02-.05	-	-
1400	2.0-2.2	.05-.10	-	-
1450	2.0-2.3	.05-.10	-	-
1500	2.4	.05-.10	1.82	76
1550	3.0	.10-.15	-	-
1600	4.1	0.20	2.87	70
1650	5.2	0.35	2.95	56
1700	5.1	0.70	2.78	55
1750	5.8	0.70	2.64	46
1801	8.7	0.96	3.14	36
1851	16.7	2.36	3.84	23
1901	41.6	6.53	-	-
1951	50.2	8.20	-	-
2001	58.8	7.30	1.2	2B
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Notes: Populations before 1700 are somewhat speculative. The Black Death starting in about 1349 is thought to have reduced the population by 30-50%. The increases in population since 1600 have required a much more productive agricultural output to grow enough for the population to avoid famine. B: About 40-50% of Britain's food is now imported.

To grow more food the land has to be maintained at its present nutrient level or made more fertile so it can grow larger and better crops. One of the keys to the Agricultural revolution was manure and bacteria which could be used to make the land more fertile. When plants grow they take plant nutrients from the soil. Continually growing the same crop on the same fields will deplete the soil in its needed plant nutrients and the crop yields will continually go down or cease. One way around this problem is to move to new land and start over. England was too well developed with about one third of its about 39,000,000 acres already put to crop use (about the same as today) with another third in pasture and the final third composed of waste, forest, villages etc. England’s slash and burn agricultural stage was largely behind it. A crop takes from its field 1.3-2.0% of its weight in nitrogen (N),0.13-0.3% in phosphorous (P) and 1.0-2.0% in potassium (K) and other needed trace minerals. Twenty bushels of wheat (60 lb/bu) taken from a one acre field takes about 20 pounds of N with it, 100 bu/acre will remove about 100 lbs. N/acre, etc.. The carbon, hydrogen and oxygen that constitute about 96% of the weight of a typical plant are turned into organic growth by CO₂ in the air and H₂O from the soil plus dissolved plant nutrients in the soil undergoing photosynthesis using the sun’s energy. In nature nearly all of these nutrients are normally in some sort of equilibrium with the plant nutrients returned to the soil when the plants or animals that eat the plants die. When you remove a crop this equilibrium state is disturbed.

Fertilizers and manure

Darkened topsoil with large concentration of organic matterand reddish subsoil layers show plant roots seeking plant nutrition elements and water. Compost and manure is added mainly to the top six inches (15cm) of soil where most plants grow.

When animals eat a plant (or other animal) about 80-90% of the plant nutrients absorbed by the plant pass though the animal and are excreted as manure. It became widely known that manure was a great fertilizer that could be used to restore or enhance the productivity of arable land. Manure is an excellent natural fertilizer that restores many of the nutrients absorbed in growing the crops and that when regularly applied to the soil allows the growing of the same or larger crops on the same land. One advantage of natural manures is that they tend to decompose slowly giving a long term boost to the plant nutrients and add organic matter to the soil that helps keep water better controlled and keeps the soil looser for easier plant growth. One major disadvantage they have is that 30-40% of the nutrients in the manure typically leach away before they can be applied. The macro-nutrients Nitrogen (N), phosphorus (P), potassium (K)and other plant nutrients are all present in manure. Different types of manure have different ratios of the macro-nutrients N:P:K. Manure was about the only fertilizer that was available to be regularly added to the soil before techniques were developed to make commercial fertilizers. If the plant nutrient levels are to be kept high enough to continue growing crops on the same soil some type of fertilizer is nearly always needed. The manure is provided by the animals from the grain, hay and grass they eat and has to be distributed where it is needed to maintain the plant nutrient levels. Human manure (known as nightsoil) has an N:P:K ratio of 0.51:0.1:0.23 and was commonly used in market gardens around London from the 1600s to the late 1800s to help grow vegetables for the London market. Urine can contain about 95% water and up to 90 percent of the N (nitrogen), up to 50 percent of the P (phosphorus) and up to 70 percent of the K (potassium) present in excreta and is also a good though dilute fertilizer.

Manure spreaders are still used today to help distribute this natural fertilizer. Application of waste products to agricultural land is an efficient method of recycling them, while at the same time improving the productive capacity of soils Manure still provides significant organic plant nutrients (fertilizer) to soil and significantly reduces the need for commercial fertilizers.

Naturally occurring organic materials like kelp; seaweed; sawdust; wheat, rye, oat and pea straw; pig, sheep, goat, chicken, pigeon, horse, cow dung; cow and horse urine; feathers; leaves of trees; compost; bat or sea bird guano; ground bone; blood meal; dried blood, oyster shells; sea shells; rotten food; wood ash; coal and wood soot; cow hair; horn shavings; rags and many other organic substances were all tried with various degrees of success. By 1850 all these substances (and more) had experimental ratings in the literature with cow manure as the standard.

Naturally occurring mineral deposits like limestone, rock phosphates, Chilean sodium nitrate (saltpeter), all have significant amounts of needed plant nutrients and were all discovered by 1830 and used on a trail and error basis. Not surprisingly, in light of what is now known, different soils were deficient in different plant nutrients and different additives helped some soils more than others. Chilean saltpeter (discovered in Britain about 1830) and bat and sea bird guano were found so advantageous that a large market developed for them and they were being bought and shipped half way around the world for use on British farms by 1850.

One of the major disadvantages that farmers had till the late 1800s is that chemistry was just getting established on a scientific basis in this time period and the farmers did not know what minerals were needed as plant nutrients or what different organic compounds were available to fill these needs. There was no way to test the soil to see what plant nutrients were missing. Manure and other soil additive applications were nearly always on a trial and error basis; but some applications were successful and various practices gradually evolved as helping to keep and restore the soil so it could continue to grow larger crops. In general it was found that adding any organic matter to the soil helped it--some types helped more than others.

If legume plants like clover, peas, beans, etc. are planted they have a symbiotic relationship with bacteria (rhizobia) found on their root nodules that allows these plants to use nitrogen out of the air for their own growth and fix atmospheric nitrogen (NH3) in the soil. The ability to form this mutualism reduces fertilizer costs for farmers and gardeners who grow legumes, and allows legumes to be used in a crop rotation sequence to help replenish soil that has been depleted of nitrogen. If these legumes are plowed under after one or two years growth they are a form of green manure that helps restore the N level in the soil even better. Legume crops have about 60-80% of the N they produce in their foliage available for hay production or animal grazing. Even if the plants are eaten the manure these animals produce will still have most of the N enhancement.

Compost is recycled organic matter that has been allowed to decomposed and can be used as a fertilizer and soil amendment. Before the advent of chemical fertilizers compost was (and still is) a key ingredient in organic farming. At the simplest level, the process of composting simply requires making a heap of wetted organic matter (leaves, food waste, grass, wood chips, etc.) and waiting for the materials to break down into humus over a period of weeks or months. Composted material can then be spread as a soil additive to get better yields, better weed control and better control of the moisture content of the soil. On a volume basis a good quality soil is one that is 45% minerals, 25% water, 25% air, and 5% organic material, both live and dead. The mineral and organic components are considered a constant with the percentages of water and air the only variable parameters where the increase in one is balanced by the reduction in the other.

Maximizing Crops

See also: Three-field crop rotation

Crop Yield net of Seed (bushels/acre)
Year	Wheat	Rye	Barley	Oats	Peas beans	Growth rate (%/year)$
1250-1299	8.71	10.71	10.25	7.24	6.03	-0.27
1300-1349	8.24	10.36	9.46	6.60	6.14	-.032
1350-1399	7.46	9.21	9.74	7.49	5.86	0.61
1400-1449	5.89	10.46	8.44	6.55	5.42	0.08
1450-1499	6.48	13.96	8.56	5.95	4.49	0.48
1550-1599	7.88	9.21	8.40	7.87	7.62	-0.16
1600-1649	10.45	16.28	11.16	10.97	8.62	-0.11
1650-1699	11.36	14.19	12.48	10.82	8.39	0.64
1700-1749	13.79	14.82	15.08	12.27	10.23	0.70
1750-1799	17.26	17.87	21.88	20.90	14.19	0.37
1800-1849	23.16	19.52	25.90	28.37	17.85	0.63
1850-1899	26.69	26.18	23.82	31.36	16.30	-
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Notes: Yields have had the seed used to plant the crop subtracted to give net yields. Average seed sown; wheat 2.5 bu/acre; Rye 2.5 bu/acre; Barley 3.5-4.30 bu/acre; Oats 2.5-4.0 bu/acre; Peas & beans 2.50-3.0 bu/acre. $ Average annual growth rate of agricultural output is per agricultural worker.

During the Middle Ages, the open field system had initially used a two field crop rotation system where one field was left fallow or turned into pasture for a time to try to recover some of its plant nutrients. Later they employed a three year , three field crop rotation, with a different crop in each of two fields, e.g. oats, rye, wheat and barley with the second field growing a legume like peas or beans with the third field fallow. Each field was rotated into a different crop nearly every year. Over the following two centuries, the regular planting of legumes like peas and beans in the fields which were previously fallow slowly restored the fertility of croplands. The planting of legumes helped to increase plant growth in the empty field due to the bacteria on legume roots ability to fix nitrogen from the air into the soil. Other crops that were occasionally grown were flax and members of the mustard family.

One way to get more land to grow food on is to cut down on the amount of land left fallow to try to recover some of its plant nutrients. Normally from 10-30% of the arable land in a three crop rotation system is fallow. The British Agricultural Revolution was aided by land maintenance advancements in Flanders, and the Netherlands. Due to the large and dense population of Flanders and Holland, farmers there were forced to take maximum advantage of every inch of usable land, the country had become a pioneer in canal building, soil restoration and maintenance, soil drainage and land reclamation technology. Dutch experts like Cornelius Vermuyden brought some of this technology to Britain. The farmers in Flanders (in parts of France and current day Belgium) discovered a still more effective four-field rotation system, using turnips and clover (a legume) as forage crops to replace the three year crop rotation fallow year. "Turnip" Townshend and others introduced to England the four-field crop rotation pioneered by farmers in the Flanders, Belgium region in the early 16th century.

The four field rotation system allowed farmers to restore soil fertility and restore some of the plant nutrients removed with the crops. Turnips first show up in the probate records in England as early as 1638 but were not widely used till about 1750. Fallow land was about 20% of the arable area in England in 1700 before turnips and clover were extensively introduced, and steadily declined to reach only about 4 % in 1900. Ideally, wheat, barley, turnips and clover would be planted in that order in each field in successive years. The turnips helped keep the weeds down and were an excellent forage crop that ruminant animals could eat their tops and roots through a large part of the summer and winters. There was little need to let the soil lie fallow as Clover would re-add nitrates (Nitrogen-containing salts) back to the soil through the root nodules attached to them which harboured symbiotic bacteria. These bacteria take nitrogen from the atmosphere and in turn produce the nitrates needed by the plants. Some nitrates are left in the soil when the plant dies are is plowed under. The clover made excellent pasture and hay fields as well as green manure when it was plowed under after one or two years. The addition of clover and turnips allowed more animals to be kept through the winter which in turn produced more milk, cheese, meat and manure which allowed the grain fields to be fertilized better—a virtuous circle.

Another way to get more land was to convert some pasture land into arable land and recover fen land and some pastures. It is estimated that the amount of arable land in Britain grew by 10-30% through these land conversions.

Water-meadows were utilized in the late 16th to the 20th centuries and allowed earlier pasturing of livestock after they were wintered on hay, etc.. This increased livestock yields giving more hides, meat, milk and manure as well as better hay crops.

Crop rotation is the practice of growing a series of dissimilar types of crops in the same area in sequential seasons to help restore plant nutrients and it helps mitigate the build-up of pathogens and pests that often occurs when one plant species is continuously cropped, and can also improve soil structure and fertility by alternating deep-rooted and shallow-rooted plants. The Norfolk System, as it is now known, rotates crops so that different crops are planted with the result that different kinds and quantities of nutrients are taken from the soil as the plants grow.

The mix of crops also changed, replacing some low-yielding types, such as rye, with higher-yielding types such as wheat or barley. Grain yields also increased as new and better seed was introduced. Wheat yields increased by about 25% between 1700 and 1800, and then by about another 50% between 1800 and 1850.

Fences and Enclosures

See also: Enclosure

See also: Common land

To manage agricultural land and livestock productively they usually have to be separated. Domesticated livestock if let loose can and often do destroy or damage a crop or over graze a pasture. Historically, the control of animals has often meant the hiring of a pig, cow, sheep, horse herders to control the movements of the animals. To minimize cost, herds of a particular village were often combined to allow less herders. Often the animals were brought back to village at night for fertilizing, feeding, milking, shearing, slaughtering or shelter. Flocks of livestock were often put in small fenced fields at night to spread their manure there. The manure came from digested food eaten by the livestock in a large pasture or fallow area during the day. Fences consisting of wooden stakes, rocks, hedges and later metal fences of netting and barbed wire minimized the need for these herders. Fences nearly always marked the boundaries of different farm properties that were bought, sold or rented to different farmers. These separate fields in turn allowed farmers to use more labor or capital intensive techniques to grow more food. Since Yeomen and husbandmen did most of the farm work with their own family and a few hired workers, more productive farms allowed more "extras" to be bought by the families and workers. These in turn provided the incentives needed to grow more food.

Fences are often needed to improve livestock herds. Selected animals are chosen and bred through several generations to develop a particular breed. These animals need to be raised separately from common flocks to control the selective breeding cycle. Often selected horse studs, bulls, rams, boars, roosters, etc. are bought and bred with the goal of improving the herds. Often "choice" animals are bred to other animals as a source of income.

Prior to the 18th century, agriculture had been much the same across Europe since the Middle Ages. The open field system was essentially feudal, with many subsistence farmers-cropping strips of land in one of three or four large fields held in common and splitting up the products likewise. The work was typical preformed under the auspices of the Aristocracy or the Catholic Church who owned much of the land.

Beginning as early as the 12th century, some of the common fields in England tilled under the traditional open field system were enclosed into individually owned fields. The Black Death in 1349 and on essentially broke up the feudal system in England. To get more yield from a farm required a more secure control of the land--improvements are seldom made to "community" or commonly owned property. Many farms were bought by Yeomen who enclosed their property and improved the use of their land. Other husbandmen rented property they "share cropped" with the owners of the land. The process of enclosing property accelerated in the 15th and 16th centuries. This led to some villagers losing their land and their grazing rights and left many unemployed. English Poor Laws were enacted to help get over these adjustments and many started migrating to the cities looking for work. Only a few found work in the (increasingly mechanized) enclosed farms for good. Many relocated to the cities or colonies to try to find their fortune or work in the emerging factories of the Industrial Revolution. Many of these enclosures were accomplished by acts of Parliament in the 16th and 17th centuries. Some of the practices of enclosures were denounced by the Church, and legislation was drawn up against it; but the developments in agricultural mechanization during the 16-18th century required large, enclosed fields to be successfully workable to provide more food for all. All this controversy led to a series of government acts, culminating in the General Enclosure Act of 1801, which sanctioned large-scale land reform.

By the end of the 18th century the process of enclosure was largely complete.

British agriculture 1800-1900

Britain in 1800 was well underway on its Industrial Revolution and being ahead of most of the rest of the world could make and sell some products cheaper than anyone else. Initially this advantage was in the textile industry but soon the British use of coal and producing steel and steam power for trains, ships, factories, agriculture, etc. were rapidly increased and very competitive. New agricultural implements were invented at an increasing pace all through the 1800s allowing agricultural population in Britain to actually decrease. Some of this new capital was plowed back into agriculture to make the crop yields as large as possible.

New fertilizers, besides the organic fertilizers in manure, were slowly found as massive sodium nitrate (NaNO₃) deposits found in the Atacama desert, Chile, were brought under British financiers like John Thomas North and imports were started. Chile was happy to allow the exports of these sodium nitrates by allowing the British to use their capital to develop the mining and imposing a hefty export tax to enrich their treasury. Massive deposits of sea bird guano, (11-16% N, 8-12% phosphate and 2-3% potash (KCl+)) were found and started to be imported after about 1830. Significant imports of potash (KCl+) obtained from the ashes of trees burned in opening new agricultural lands were imported. By-products of British the meat industry like bones from the knacker’s yards were ground up and sold as fertilizer. By about 1840 about 30,000 tons of bones were being processed (worth about £150,000). An unusual alternative to bones was found to be millions of tons of fossils called coprolites was found in South East England. When these were dissolved in sulfuric acid they yielded a high phosphate mixture (called “super”) that plants could absorb readily and increased crop yields. Mining coprolite and processing it for fertilizer soon developed into a major industry—the first commercial fertilizer. Higher yield crops per acre were also planted as potatoes went from about 300,000 acres in 1800 to about 400,000 acres in 1850 with a further increase to about 500,000 in 1900.Labor productivity slowly increased at about 0.6% per year. Crop yields with more capital invested and more fertilizer (equivalents) used increased at about 0.5%/year.

The British population in 1800 was about 8.7 million increasing to 16.7 million in 1851 and 41.6 million by 1901. This corresponds to a rate of population increase from 1801 to 1851 of 1.84% per year and a rate of population increase of 3.00% per year from 1851-1901. Not only did the need for more food increase but the need for more shoes, clothes, etc. increases at the same or a greater rate as more products became available. This rate of increase was much faster than the rate of increased agricultural yield per acre (hectare) which increased at about a rate of 0.5% per year from 1800 to 1850 and 0.2% per year from 1850 to 1900. Increased food imports were critical in feeding the rapidly growing urban population during the industrial revolution.

Needing massive amounts of more food the answer was to add more acres under cultivation and pasture. In addition to needing more land for cultivation there was also needed more pasture land to grow more poultry, livestock and draft horses and other agricultural products. The British Agricultural Statistics for this period show this competition for more land for cultivation and more land for pasturage in Britain was won by the need for more pasture as the arable land actually decreased from about 7.5 million hectares in 1800 to about 6.0 million hectares in 1900. The number of acres under wheat cultivation decreased from about 1.5 million hectares in 1800 to about 0.6 million hectares in 1900.

The only solution to this problem of rapidly increasing population and increased need for food and other agricultural products was to add more acres under cultivation. The way the food shortage was “solved” was to import much more food—use the acres in another country. Most of the British colonies (and ex colonies like the United States) had large acreage of potentially arable land. Much of Europe was eager to get British products and with their much slower increasing populations could produce agricultural products for trade. The products being produced in the British Industrial Revolution were easily traded for food and other products like tea, cotton and wool, etc. needed in Britain.

So many cheap agricultural imports were coming into Britain during and after the Napoleonic wars (1803-1815) and the resumption of American trade after the War of 1812 (1812-1815) that the Corn Laws (protective tariffs) were passed to protect cereal grain producers in Britain against competition from less expensive foreign imports. These laws were in force between 1815 and 1846. These were removed in 1846 at the onset of the potato blight hitting much of Europe. The Irish Potato Famine that ruined the Irish potato crop and brought devastation to the Irish people in 1846-48 also occurred in England, Wales and Scotland and the rest of Europe. The effect was much less since potatoes were a smaller percentage of the diet of the people of England, Wales and Scotland and they had the capital to buy and import food from other countries.

The British Merchant Marine of this period was the largest in the world and easily capable of hauling most of the products. Other Merchant Navies were available to facilitate the trade not carried on British ships. There was so much trade going on that the United States of America, for example, paid for about 80-90% of their federal government through tariffs (customs) of about 10-20% on imports till the expenses of the American Civil War (1860-1865) forced new taxes.

Between 1873 and 1879 British agriculture had wet summers that damaged grain crops. Cattle farmers were hit by foot-and-mouth disease, and sheep farmers by sheep liver rot. The poor harvests, however, masked a greater threat to British agriculture: growing imports of foodstuffs from abroad. The development of the steam ship and the development of an extensive railroad networks in Britain and the USA allowed US farmers with much larger and more productive farms to export hard grain to Britain at a price that undercut the British farmers. At the same time, large amounts of cheap corned beef started to arrive from Argentina and the development of refrigerator ships (reefers) in about 1870 the and the opening of the Suez Canal opened (1869) the British market to cheap lamb and wool from Australia and New Zealand. By 1900 half the meat eaten in Britain came from abroad. The Long Depression was a worldwide economic recession, that began in 1873 and ended around 1896. It hit the agricultural sector hard and was the most severe in Europe and the United States, which had been experiencing strong economic growth fueled by the Second Industrial Revolution in the decade following the American Civil War.

Mechanization of Agriculture

See also: List of agricultural machinery

A tall black horse with white legs standing next to an average-sized woman who is holding the horse, but whose chin is only level with the horse's nostril. This horse is at a horse show and has flowers braided into its mane and tail and is wearing a black surcingle decorated with brass studs.

Shires are one of the largest horse breeds; note comparison to human handler

Two Clydesdales in a plowing competition

The main effect of mechanization and the addition of new farming implements, has been the increased productivity of each farm worker who can do more, sometimes several times more, work per day than he could without a particular mechanization. In the 1600s each agricultural worker grew enough food to feed about 1.25 people. Today each agricultural worker grows enough food to feed about 30 people. The mechanization of agriculture has been going on for centuries as new tools and capabilities were gradually adapted by the agricultural community. Mechanization really took off after 1750 when new metal technologies made cheap steel and cast iron available and the development of steam power during the Industrial Revolution added another source of power on the farms that gradually displaced almost all of the others. The speed of mechanization has often been controlled by the size of the farm--small farms were seldom profitable enough to afford much new equipment. Typically this problem was "solved" by the farms consolidating into larger farms and/or sharing equipment--this process is still continuing today. Nearly always each new invention or mechanical device makes farm work less strenuous and faster.

Abraham Darby I (1678 –1717) was the first, and most famous, of three generations with that name in an English Quaker family that developed a method of producing pig iron in a blast furnace fuelled by the much more available coke made from coal rather than charcoal produced from wood. Pig iron in turn was the precursor of cast iron and steel—a major ingredient of the Industrial Revolution. As iron and steel became ever more prevalent and cheaper they were used to make more cheaper metal tools and farm implements and ever more complicated metal farm implements.

The tools used by a farmer in the 1500s could almost be carried in a small cart: shovels, axes, hoes, rakes, pitchforks, scythes, cradles, flails, wooden plows, oxbows, chains, knives, scissors, saws, hammers, carts later horse shoes, horse collars and harnesses were added as the farmers switched form ox power to horse power. Initially many of these tools were made mostly of wood with the farmer creating them from the raw material available. The first farm work was done by hand with a hoe to cut down weeds and prepare the soil for planting with an axe or fire to help clear the forest for planting. The first animal power to be applied to farming in Britain were usually oxen that were gradually displaced after 1700 by large work horses like the Shire horse and Clydesdale horse that were large horses that originally were bred to carry fully armoured knights. Oxen were gradually replaced since they did not take well to surfaced roads. Horses could be easily shod to protect their feet on hard surfaces. Oxen could be shod also but this was a much moare complicated process. Despite the fact that a large oxen is nearly as powerful as a large horse and had the advantage that they could be sold for food at the end of their lifes they were gradually replaced. Cows were bred for either beef or dairy production and seldom as draft animals. So many more horses were brought into use and almost no oxen were used by 1900. The horses were gradually displaced after 1900 with the invention of the tractor. Many small farmers could not afford the cost of a tractor and continued to use horses till well into the 1940s.

Weeding progressed from a hoe or mattock to a man pushed wheeled hoe to metal cultivators with steel or iron blades and wheels. Later these metal cultivators were pulled by oxen, horses and after about 1920 by tractors.

Schema of a contemporary plough.
1 Frame 2 Three-point hitch 3 Height regulator 4 Knife or Coulter (a round rotating steel disc is often used) 5 Chisel 6 Share, also called the ploughshare 7 Mouldboard 8 Plough shaft Other portions include the frog,
runner, land side, shin, trash board and handles, and wheels

Ploughs advanced from a forked wooden stick making a furrow (often called a hog plow because they root in and out of the ground) to a iron tipped wooden plow initially pulled mostly by oxen. Depending on the type of soil, a typical team of 2-6 oxen and 1-4 men could plow about one acre/day. Many crops required plowing up to three times in a season to prepare the fields for planting. Joseph Foljambe's Rotherham cast iron plough of 1730, combining an earlier Dutch design with a number of technological innovations, was the first iron plough to have any commercial success in Europe. Its fittings and coulter were made of iron and the mouldboard and share were covered with an iron plate making it lighter to pull and more controllable than previous ploughs. It remained in limited use in Britain until the development of the tractor. It was followed by James Small of Doncaster and Berwickshire in 1763, whose "Scots Plough" used an improved cast iron share to turn the soil more effectively with less draft, wear, or strain on the ploughing team. Most teams pulling plows converted to horse drawn plows sometime after 1850. John Deere’s self polishing steel plow, invented in about 1837 in America, was used on some difficult soils or pasture land. Robert Ransome’s plow factory of Ipswich, England was producing 86 different plow models designed for particular soils. Many plows had wheels added to the side or back of the plow that allowed the plow to be raised or lowered easily for transport to different fields. Without wheels the plough had to be either dragged on its side or hauled in a cart. All these metal plows were made in quantity and at “reasonable” prices because of the production of cheap steel and iron.

Clydesdale horses pulling spike harrows, Murrurundi, NSW, Australia

Harrows are used for breaking up and smoothing out the surface of the soil in preparation for planting. Harrowing is often done on fields to smooth the rough soil finish often left by ploughing. They almost always consist of a rigid frame to which are attached discs, teeth, linked chains or other means of cultivation, but tine and chain harrows are often only supported by a rigid towing-bar at the front of the set. The initial harrows were constructed out of simple wood frames with perhaps wooden stakes inserted to help break up or smooth the ploughed ground to prepare a seedbed. Some harrows, often called discs, are made with revolving self cleaning steel discs that cut up, loosen and smooth the soil. On some soils larger versions of these discs can sometimes be used instead of ploughs. Other harrow types that were invented include drag tooth harrows, chain harrows and power harrows which have powered rotating discs. Harrows showed the same progression of wood construction, some cast iron parts, nearly all iron to wholly steel that were initially pulled mostly by oxen then horses which were in turn replaced by tractors by about 1900.

Jethro Tull made early advancements in planting crops with his seed drill (1701)—a mechanical seeder which sowed seeds efficiently at the correct depth and spacing and then buried them so they could grow. Before the introduction of the seed drill, the common practice was to plant seeds by broadcasting (evenly throwing) them by hand on the prepared soil and then lightly harrowing the soil to bury them to the correct depth. Other seeds were laboriously planted one by one using a hoe. Over 50 other inventors of improvements helped make his initial seed drill a machine in common use by 1900. It took a century and a half after the publication in 1731 of his Horse hoeing husbandry for farmers to widely adopt the technology. Although a pioneer in Europe, Tull was not the first to invent or use a seed drill; its origins can be traced back thousands of years to the East and China and other parts of Asia. The advantages of the drill were that it was faster and it could be set up to plant seeds evenly to make weeding easier. The disadvantages were it was a new “expensive” machine that only worked well on particular soils and usually did not significantly increase crop yields. By 1850 the seed drill had competition with broadcast seeders with a crank that more evenly sprayed seed over the ground. Some were combined with a wheelbarrow to allow more seed to be easily carried. Today many seed drills use air pipes that allows the seeds to be blown from a bin to a group of "coulters" set at the desired row spacing that cut slots in the ground into which the regulated amount of seeds fall. At the back of the coulters are spring tines which help to cover the seed up.

Manure spreaders used to distribute manure over a field as a fertilizer evolved from a simple farm cart to dedicated wagons or carts that was not used for other purposes. The first successful automated manure spreader was designed by Joseph Kemp in 1875. This and later manure spreaders used a drag chain to pull a board at one end of a manure filled wagon that forced the manure into a series of rotating tines that spread the manure more evenly. The power for the drive chain and rotating tines came from a connection to the rotating axle driven by the tires. They now have manure spreaders that work on dry, solid and slurry manures as well as irrigation systems.

Wheat in a field ready to be harvested

Haymakers, from the Grimani Breviary, c. 1510.

July 1903 - on the Gaisberg, nr Salzburg

Grain was originally harvested by cutting the grain with a sickle or scythe, tying the grain in bundles that were gathered into sheaves and allowed to dry before being brought to a harvesting barn by wagon where the grain was beat with flails to separate the grain from its straw. The grain straw was separated and then hauled off for other uses. The next operation was to separate the chaff from the grain by throwing it into the air in a wind and letting the heavier gain fall to the floor while the chaff blew away. The grain was then typically sacked for storage or sale. Wagons were again used to haul off the grain and straw. This was a very time consuming and laborious process that usually involved nearly all able bodied people on a farm or in a village for a period of several weeks.

Hay is grass, legumes like clover and alfalfa or other herbaceous plants that have been cut, dried, and stored for use as animal fodder. It is typically used to feed grazing livestock such as cattle, horses, goats, and sheep during the winter or other times when food is scarce. The hay originally was cut with scythes, dried and collected with rakes and then put onto a wagon pulled by oxen and then horses to a haystack where it was stacked for winter use. The first major improvement seen after about 1850s when the sickle bar oscillating mowing head pulled by a team of horses was introduced. The power for the mower head was provided by the rotating wheels. Horse drawn: mowers, rakes, haystackers etc. were some of the first improvements seen in the mid 1850s and on. By the late 1920s these machines were largely replaced by tractor drawn implements (many made originally for horses). Today hay is cut with wide hay mowers and left to dry. It is then raked into rows where is picked up by large balers that compress a cut and raked crop into compact bales that are easy to handle, transport and store. Some of the bales now made are round and can weigh anywhere from 1,100 to 2,200 pounds (500 to 1,000 kg) and have to be handled with powered equipment.

A sketch of an early McCormick reaper

A Massey-Harris reaper-binder pulled by a tractor (Rutland, England, 2008)

One of the first things to be speeded up in harvesting was the cutting of the grain. The reaper used a reciprocating toothed knife blades, the sickle bar, to cut the grain. The sickle bar moves back and forth through guard plates that hold the grain while the reciprocating sickle bar's serrated triangular shaped cutting knives sheared the grain off. A hair clipper works much the same way. The cutting knives are protected against hitting most rocks by allowing the sickle bar to move up and down and putting steel projections (called point guards) in front of the knives. If a rock is hit the sickle bar rises as it is forced to go over the top of the rock. The toothed blade consist of serrated triangular shaped knifes that can easily be replaced on the sickle bar if they get dull or damaged. The rotating reel above the cutter bar pushes the cut grain onto the bed of the reaper. The cut grain was raked by another person riding on the reaper into rows awaiting other workers who bundled the grain into sheaves. The reaper was pulled by a team of two horses walking at the side of the grain allowing the reaper to by pulled instead of pushed by the draft animals. An improved grain cutting blade (a sickle bar with replaceable serrated triangular shaped teeth) acquired in 1850 made the reaper much more efficient. The long involved harvesting process was still there only the grain cutting was faster. A later improvement showing up in about 1870 was a reaper-binder that cut the grain and tied it into bundles. A still later improvement used a type of conveyor belt behind the reel to load the gain and stalks using a conveyor belt into a wagon traveling next to the reaper. The wagon hauled the cut grain to the thresher where the gain was separated from its stalk and chaff. The reaper had to stop until a new wagon could be driven up to take the grain.

The thrashing machine, or, in modern spelling,threshing machine (or simply thresher), was a machine first invented by Scottish mechanical engineer Andrew Meikle for use in harvesting grains. It was invented (c.1784) for the separation of grain from stalks and husks (straw). Many other farmers and inventors improved the original design over many years. Power for the thresher came initially from a team of about six to eight horses walking in a circle around a bullwheel which was connected by long belt which powered all the different thresher parts. The original thresher was stationary with stemmed grain fed to it manually and the separated grain and straw removed manually. The separated grain was usually put in sacks that were sown together by two men who sewed up to 1,000 sacks a day. Other workers were needed to drive wagons to load and deliver the grain to where it was stored and haul off the straw. A harvest crew could be as large as 18 to 30 people with 20 to 30 horses used to power all the wagons and thresher. One of the first improvements made was to replace the bull wheel and its teams of horses with a stationary steam engine turning a large pulley and a long wide leather belt to the power the thresher. Steam tractors were often made to be primarily stationary engines and used coal, wood or straw to keep the water hot.

The threshing mechanism consisted of a rotating threshing drum (commonly called the "cylinder"), to which grooved steel bars (rasp bars) are bolted. These rotating bars pulled the grain through the thresher. The rasp bars thresh or separate the grains and chaff from the straw through the action of the pushing and bending the grain against the "concave" cylinder, a shaped "half drum" fitted with steel bars and a meshed grill, through which grain, chaff and smaller debris falls. The straw, being too long and light, is carried through the concave onto the straw walkers to be conveyed out of the machine at a separate outlet. A separate blower section in the thresher blows the lighter chaff off the grain to get a chaff free grain. The grain is heavier than the straw and chaff, which causes it to fall rather than "float" across from the cylinder/concave to the walkers. These machines were typically so large that it may take a team of 18 to 30 horses to move them from one harvest field to the next. The large harvest crew of 18 to 30 men typically stayed together for the whole season working 10-12 hour days. The chaff and straw typically raised large clouds of dust the harvesting crews had to work in. Usually the women on the farm being harvested or adjacent farms prepared the meals for the men at each farm.

Harvesting oats in a self propelled Claas Lexion 570 combine with enclosed, air-conditioned cab with rotary thresher and laser-guided hydraulic steering

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A early steam tractor, towing a living van and a water cart:
Ransomes, Sims & Jefferies Ltd 6nhp Jubilee of 1908. Note large black pulley near driver used for powering threshing machines etc.

1882 Harrison Machine Works steam-powered tractor. Note large red pulley near driver used for powering threshing machines etc.

Fordson Model F tractor built in the UK from 1917-1964 by Ford Motor Company and its affiliates. Note large steel wheels on this early model.

1955 Ferguson TEF

Caterpillar D4H LGP (Low Ground Pressure) model with wide tracks.

A major improvement was to marry the reaper and the thresher in a single machine called a combine. The combine name derives from the fact that it combines three separate operations, reaping, threshing, and winnowing, into a single process. The first combines were mad in the 1850s but it took till after the 1920s for them to become common. In the original versions the bullwheel and its horses that powered the combine was replaced with large steel drive wheels that turned as the whole combine apparatus was pulled across a grain field with large teams of up 24 to 30 horses. The wheel's outer surface turned the cutting bar and thresher cylinders, etc. as the implement was pulled forward and support wheels rotated. The swath bar in the front of the combine cut the grain as it progressed. The large rotating reel above the cutter bar pushes the cut grain onto the combine's first conveyor belt that delivered the grain to the threshing part of the combine. Soon power for the various mechanisms in the combine were powered by small steam engines mounted on the thresher and the power connection to the drive wheels was eliminated. These engines were replaced in turn by gasoline engines as they became available after about 1900. As tractors became available they replaced the large team of horses to pull the combine. These types of pulled combines were used till the 1940’s in some areas. The original combines cut and threshed the grain, and spread the straw were typically pulled by large teams of horses and later tractors. Many small farmers could not afford to buy these expensive, complicated machines and either hired someone to custom cut their grain for a fee or used what "old" equipment they had. Combines increased the harvest speed, cut the crew of men needed to harvest the crop for 30 down to today's two to three and made grain "cheap" to help feed the world.

The combine harvester of today, or simply combine, is a self propelled machine typically powered by up to 400 hp diesel engines. Among the crops harvested with a combine are wheat, oats, rye, barley, corn (maize), soybeans and flax (linseed). The waste straw left behind on the field is the remaining dried stems and leaves of the crop with limited nutrients which is either chopped and spread on the field for organic fertilizer or baled for feed and bedding for livestock. Combine harvesters are one of the most important labor saving inventions, enabling a small fraction of the population to be engaged in agriculture. The high cost (over USD $400,000 for some) of these combines has led to “custom” cutting where a combine or several combines are bought and run by an individual or company to cut many different farmer’s fields for a fee. The combines, despite being large wide machines, sometimes use the highways to travel to adjacent fields--other vehicular traffic is stopped to allow this. They typically follow the harvest from area to area as different crops are ready to harvest. They are typically pulled to their next location if its very far away on large Semi-trailer truck with their wide (up to 40 feet (12 m) wide} cutting head removed. Custom cutting allows the cost of the combine to be spread over many farmers as a combine can often run over several weeks or months of operation. A combine with a 40 feet (12 m) cutting bar can harvest 80-200 acres (32-80 hectares) per 12-15 hour day and may be able to be run daily for nearly two months.

The first farm implements were powered primarily by oxen. Stating about 1750 horses started replacing them as draft animals. The most popular draft horses in Britain were Clydesdale horses and Shire horses. By 1900 oxen were very rare as steam power began to replace horses on the larger farms. The first powered farm implements in the early 19th century were coal or wood burning portable engines – steam engines on wheels that could be used to drive mechanical threshers by way of a long wide leather flexible belt. These were typically so large and expensive that a threshing crew of from 8-18 men hauled the machines to separate farms where they threshed until done and then went on to the next farm. In a given season many farmer’s crops would be threshed. Around 1850, the first traction engines and stationary engines were developed from these, and were adopted for agricultural use on large farms. The steam engines were often so large they often used a cord of wood or a ton of coal per day. Initially, there were no large rubber tires for farm machinery and all agricultural machinery, except farm trucks, traveled on steel tires.

A tractor' is a vehicle specifically designed to deliver a high tractive effort (or torque) at slow speeds, for the purposes of hauling a trailer or machinery used in agriculture or construction. Most commonly, the term tractor is used to describe a farm vehicle that provides the power and traction to mechanize agricultural tasks, especially (and originally) tillage but nowadays a great variety of tasks. Initially tractors were powered by steam and were typically so large that they could only be profitably used on very large farms. Agricultural implements may be towed behind or mounted on the tractor, and the tractor may also provide a source of power if the implement is mechanised. The first tractors were steam-powered plowing engines. They were used in pairs, placed on either side of a field to haul a plow back and forth between them using a wire cable. Where soil conditions and farm size permitted (as in the United States) steam tractors were used to direct-haul plows, but in the UK and elsewhere plowing engines were used for cable-hauled plowing instead. Some steam-powered agricultural engines remained in use well into the 20th century until reliable internal combustion engines had been developed.

In 1892, John Froelich invented and built the first gasoline/petrol-powered tractor in Clayton County, Iowa, USA. After receiving a patent Froelich started up the Waterloo Gasoline Engine Company, investing all of his assets which by 1895, all would be lost and his business resigned to become a failure. The original tractors when used to pull implements normally pulled farm implements originally designed and built to be pulled by horses.

The Fordson tractor invented by Ford Motor Company and build in Ireland and Dagenham, UK was one of the most popular tractors in the UK from about 1920 to 1950 as it was rugged, reasonably priced due to Ford's well organised mass production lines and showed up just as the manpower ravages of World War I hit the UK agricultural industry. About 1938 low pressure rubber tires were introduced and soon became the standard for all new tractors--they were much more comfortable riding than steel tires, did the job as well and were compatible with traveling on finished roads. Today up to eight large tires may be on larger tractors. The Ferguson TE20, developed by Irish engineer Harry Ferguson, was the most popular tractor in the UK after about 1950 as its small size and its three-point hitch made it a very versatile and compatible with many small farms.

For heavy duty work tractors have been developed with "Caterpillar" treads as built by Caterpillar Inc. and several other companies. These types of tractors were first built in about 1905 and have evolved into many different types and sizes made by several companies all over the world. These are about the only tractors left with steel "tires".

Selective breeding

In England, Robert Bakewell and Thomas Coke introduced selective breeding (mating together two animals with particularly desirable characteristics), and inbreeding (the mating of close relatives, such as father and daughter, or brother and sister, to stabilize certain qualities) in order to reduce genetic diversity in desirable animals programs from the mid 18th century. Robert Bakewell cross-bred the Lincoln and Longhorn sheep to produce the New Leicester variety. These methods proved successful in the production of larger and more profitable livestock.

Effects on history

Sound advice on farming began to appear in England in the mid-17th century, from writers such as Samuel Hartlib, Walter Blith and others, but the overall agricultural productivity of Britain started to grow significantly only in the period of the Agricultural Revolution. It is estimated that the productivity of wheat was about 19 bushels per acre in 1720 and that it has grown to 21–22 bushels in the middle of the eighteenth century. It declined slightly in the decades of 1780 and 1790 but it began to grow again by the end of the century and reached a peak in the 1840s around 30 bushels per acre, stabilising thereafter.

The Agricultural Revolution in Britain proved to be a major turning point in history. The population in 1750 reached the level of 5.7 million. This had happened before: in around 1350 and again in 1650. Each time, either the appropriate agricultural infrastructure to support a population this high was not present or plague or war occurred (which may have been related), a Malthusian catastrophe occurred, and the population fell. However, by 1750, when the population reached this level again, an onset in agricultural technology and new methods without outside disruption, and also the effects of sugar imports, allowed the population growth to be sustained.

The increase in population led to more demand from the people for goods such as clothing. A new class of landless labourers, products of enclosure, provided the basis for cottage industry, a stepping stone to the Industrial Revolution. To supply continually growing demand, shrewd businessmen began to pioneer new technology to meet demand from the people. This led to the first industrial factories. People who once were farmers moved to large cities to get jobs in the factories. The British Agricultural Revolution not only made the population increase possible, but also increased the yield per agricultural worker, meaning that a larger percentage of the population could no longer work in agriculture but could and/or had to work in these new, post–Agricultural Revolution jobs.

The British Agricultural Revolution was the cause of drastic changes in the lives of British women. Before the Agricultural Revolution, women worked alongside their husbands in the fields and were an active part of farming. The increased efficiency of the new machinery, along with the fact that this new machinery was often heavier and difficult for a woman to work, made this unnecessary and impractical, and women were relegated to other roles in society. To supplement the family's income, many went into cottage industries. Others became domestic servants or were forced into professions such as prostitution. The new, limited roles of women, dubbed by one historian as "this defamation of women workers" (Valenze), fuelled prejudices of women only being fit to work in the home, and also effectively separated them from the new, mechanised areas of work, leading to a divide in the pay between men and women.

Towards the end of the 19th century, the substantial gains in British agricultural productivity were rapidly offset by competition from cheaper imports, made possible by advances in transportation, refrigeration, and many other technologies.

See also

• Agricultural gang
• Division of labour
• Urbanization

Agricultural Revolutions:

• Neolithic Revolution
• Arab Agricultural Revolution
• Green Revolution

References

• Harrison, L F C (1989). The Common People, a History from the Norman Conquest to the Present. Glasgow: Fontana. ISBN 000686136. {{cite book}}: Check |isbn= value: length (help)
• Kagan, Donald (2004). The Western Heritage. London: Prentice Hall. pp. 535–539. ISBN 0-13-182839-8.
• Overton, Mark (19 September 2002). Agricultural Revolution in England 1500 - 1850. Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-56859-5.
• Snell, K.D.M (1985). Annals of the Labouring Poor, Social Change and Agrarian England 1660-1900. Cambridge University Presslocation=Cambridge, UK. ISBN 0-521-24548-6.
• Thirsk, Joan. "'Blith, Walter (bap. 1605, d. 1654)'". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004; online edn, Jan 2008. Retrieved 2 September 2011.
• Valenze, Deborah (1995). The First Industrial Woman. Oxford Oxfordshire: Oxford University Press. p. 183. ISBN 0-19-508981-2.