276 STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY, 



SAUGATUCK AND GANGES POMOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 



There is no report from tliis society save some newspaper copies of addresses 

 given before the society during tiie year, from which two are selected as 

 especially worthy of a place in this volume. This society has done an excel- 

 lent work for Western Allegan fruit-growers, and merits hearty support. 



GREEN MANURING. 

 BY J. F. TAYLOR. 



What I know about fertilization with green manure can be told in a few 

 words. Green manures may be made from different products, such as clover, 

 corn, peas, buckwheat, oats, and rye. Anything that will grow luxuriantly 

 and quickly on a ])Oor soil may be turned to a good account in fertilizing the 

 same. At this time I shall only speak of one of these viz.: Rye, in its adapta- 

 tion to the fertilization of orchards. Farm experiments in any and every line 

 are attended with many difficulties. The same results do not always follow the 

 same apparent causes. Fertilizers of the same grade and strength do not 

 always produce the same results. Tlie atmospheric changes and rainfall enter 

 into the conditions of success with so many variations that no one can forecast 

 the result with any degree of certainty. Experiments therefore must necessar- 

 ily be repeated and carried on through a series of years with great care to 

 secure results Avorthy of much confidence. There are, however, certain anal- 

 ogies between experimental cultivation of the soil and nature's methods of 

 renewing her powers of production, so that we can not go far out of the way 

 if we allow reason and common sense to do their part of the work. 



Nature in her silent but mightv changes clothes herself in a drapery of 

 green, for both utility and beauty. When the beauty has departed with the 

 frosts of autumn then comes the utility. The vegetation which grew so lux- 

 uriantly during the past year becomes the natural fertilizer for the growths of 

 the coming summer. The leaves that fall from their dizzy heights in autumn 

 form the mould and mulch which moisten the root germs of the vegetable 

 kingdom that are "waiting for the signals of spring time to call them forth in 

 glowing verdure. It must be evident to every observer of nature that decay- 

 ing vegetation constitutes the large part of her recuperating i>ower. Frost and 

 snow and rain and heat are the chemicals thrown into her great laboratory to 

 complete the Avork of enriching the otherwise barren soil. In fact without veg- 

 etable mould the earth is mostly debris of a very poor quality, entirely unfit 

 for the production of vegetables and cereals. It is not until the outcropping 

 of a scanty vegetation of the lowest order has produced an accumulatioti of 

 alluvium that we find anything worthy to be called soil. It is also apparent 

 to every one familiar with arable lands that when the vegetable properties are 

 exhausted in any soil it becomes barren and unproductive. 



The question has been asked if soil can be made to recuperate itself. Most 

 certainly it can. All soils are formed by the natural growth and decay of veg- 



