During the twenty years preceding 1870 British agriculture experienced a period of prosperity and growth. The main system of farming used at this time was that of mixed farming which drew on the continuous methodological advances that had been made in both livestock and crop farming as far back as the seventeenth century. In this system livestock and grain crops were produced and sold whilst the silage crops, which could not be sold for cash, were consumed by the livestock.Thus producing greater supplies of manure which would, in turn, sustain greater yields of crops that could be sold as well as providing more fodder for the cattle and other livestock, such as sheep or horses, to graze on. In order to be successful a farm of this nature had to fulfil three main objectives: Firstly produce a sufficient quantity so as to be able to pay a rent to the landowner, secondly yield enough to return a profit to the farmer himself and thirdly maintain, and in some cases increase, the richness of the soil.
1 A self-sufficient farm of this nature had a limited maximum output which could only be exceeded through the purchasing of fertiliser and feed from an outside source. Such an approach would only be taken if the increased productivity would justify this higher expenditure.For this to be the case the inputs required had to be cheap and their applications produce a remarkable rise in yield as well as the prices for produce remaining high. In the first half of the nineteenth century there are indications that this was the case: Limits on an intensification of British agriculture were no longer present.
2 British agriculture was undoubtedly in a strong position by 1870 yet in the two decades which followed this a marked decline in agriculture can be seen. This decline is characterised by both the proportion of the employed population whose jobs lay in the farming sector and the prices of produce falling. With a fall in prices this intensive method of farming ceased to be profitable and problems began to arise for this "remarkably efficient, technically advanced and highly productive system of mixed farming, the product of more than two centuries of experiment and innovation".3One reason sighted for this decline in agriculture is the extremely adverse conditions experienced by Britain in the latter 1870s. This period of extreme weather lasted roughly six years and its effects were particularly significant as they were felt in both elements of the mixed farming method.
The fields were leached of precious nutrients and became unworkable whilst disease killed off large numbers of livestock. Sheep numbers fell from 18.4 million in June 1878 to 14.9 million in 1882.
4 The cruel seasons resulting disease and a drop in yields undoubtedly made life extremely demanding for the British farmer but the unfavourable weather was not a direct cause of the decline of agriculture. This bad weather did however have a lasting effect on British agriculture.The farmers were largely obsessed by the idea that the weather was causing their financial hardship right up until the mid 1880s. It is this misperception that was in fact a contributing factor to the decline of agriculture rather than the actual weather itself.
5 A preoccupation with the weather combined with the belief that they would return to prosperity once the period of foul weather was over prevented the farmers from making fundamental changes to the way in which they operated their business. The act of blaming the weather for the period of dearth delayed farmers from examining how they might improve their farms to such an extent that by the time they realised that changes were indeed necessary many were no longer financially able to do so as their economic position had become slowly weaker during the period of bad harvest. The bad weather obscured the agricultural industry's view over what was really going on. In this more subtle way the weather can indeed be said to be a cause of the decline of farming.
