The second 'stage' was machinery. One of the inventors who helped to change the way of farming was Jethro Tull. He was best known as the inventor of the seed drill, which he invented in 1701. Tull also devised a horse-drawn hoe to help with soil aeration. The seed drill was invented to help sow seeds in accurately spaced rows at a controlled rate. This made it possible for the control of weeds by horse-drawn hoe, reducing the need for farm labourers. Before the improvements of machinery, most of the local villagers would have had to help out on the farms, working on the strips of land - this also included children. The little machinery that farms did have were only made out of wood, therefore, they were not very strong, and were probably a lot slower than some of the later inventions, which were made out of iron, and drawn by horses rather than oxen.
The next 'stage' of the Agricultural Revolution was all to do with the improvements made in stock breeding. The best animals were bred together in order to produce better stock and the best of the litter were then in-bred again until an animal was produced which had no faults and was a perfect example of the best. Scientific stock breeding was introduced by Robert Bakewell by in-breeding animals with the points he wanted to encourage which produced pedigree herds of sheep and cattle.
The last major 'stage' of the Agricultural Revolution was all about crop rotation. Basically, crop rotation was the process of having a certain sequence for each crop to have chance to grow. Every year, the crops that were grown would swap, therefore, allowing other crops to be grown. crop rotation helps to maintain soil fertility, prevents the build-up of crop pests, and enables cultivation of the soil to clear weeds. The Norfolk four-course rotation originated in the UK during the 18th century and involved growing turnips, spring barley, clover, and winter wheat in sequence. Nowadays, mechanized farming and the use of artificial fertilizers and pesticides have encouraged monocropping (the repeated growing of the same crop).
The effects of the Agricultural Revolution of the 18th century were generally very good for Britain; because if it wasn't for the helpful, new inventions that were devised during that period of time, it may well have been the case that farms and farmers might've still been struggling with the same problems today. Wheat production quite reasonably increased during the Agricultural Revolution, due to the crop rotation; and the average weight of sheep and cattle went up, due to the helpful idea of stock breeding and it's improvements during this period of time. However, not everyone benefited from the Agricultural Revolution, as the poorer people would have lost their land to the richer people, due to the fact that the enclosure of the fields meant that the strips of fields were reduced so that more land could be used to grow just one crop.