These words refer to the cultivation of plants or the raising of animals, either for food or as produce. Farming is the most informal of these words and can apply to the whole range of possibilities here or to a specialization: Wheat is the main product of farming in Canada; chicken farming . Agriculture is more formal but just as all-embracing; it is widely used on all levels of speech. The word is the preferred term when used of educational institutions that teach farming as a science: courses in agriculture at the agricultural college.

All the remaining words emphasize particular aspects of farming . Husbandry now appears most often in the formal phrase animal husbandry , referring to the care and raising of all kinds of animals as an occupation. The phrase good husbandry indicates the efficient and prudent management of the affairs of farming ?or other concerns.

• He had shown good husbandry in ordering seed when the prices were at their lowest; Young married couples often learn the good husbandry of their income only after bitter experience.

Unqualified, the word pertains in Britain to small-scale farming .

Tillage refers strictly to the planting, cultivating and harvesting of crops, but is now less often used for this activity than farming itself. Agrology refers formally and specifically to the study of soil make-up and chemistry, often taught as a course in agriculture . Agronomy , also extremely formal, is more general; it includes agrology in its wider concern with the best possible conditions for maximum land use and crop output: the agrology of alkaline soils; sensible techniques of agronomy , based on crop rotation and soil fertilizers.

Gardening , like tillage , is exclusively restricted to the raising of plants. In contrast with tillage , the word is relatively informal and refers to the small-scale cultivation of fruits and vegetables or to the cultivation of flowers and shrubs as a source of pleasure or beauty. Gardening products are usually for personal use but on Australian farms a small irrigated section, called the garden , is often used to grow vegetables for market sale.

• A two-acre tomato garden between the wheat paddock and the river.

Most families did some gardening in their backyards as a way of economizing on vegetable bills during the summer and autumn; horticultural hints for gardening enthusiasts; interested in the profession of landscape gardening .