776 



Journal of Agriculture. 



[;o Dec, 1909. 



changes the aspect of affairs 

 completely. Oats, rye, barley, 

 peas and beans can all be 

 grown on every acre of the 

 IS, 000, 000 which we are con- 

 sidering, with absolute cer- 

 tainty year after year in 

 succession. The experience of 

 the last sixty years shows 

 tliat a sufficient winter rain- 

 fall is assured, and, more- 

 over, that these crops reach a 

 sufficient stage of maturity to 

 be harvested as fodder for live 

 stock before the dry summer 

 sets in. The weight of fodder, 

 whether preserved green in 

 the form of silage or dry in 

 the form of hay, is at least 

 three times as much as the 

 land will produce from the 

 best natural grasses. In many 

 years it is ten times as much. 

 Working the land allows the 

 rain to penetrate more deeply 

 into the sub-soil. The growth 

 of deep-rooted leguminous 

 crops constitutes the natural 

 process for sub soiling the 

 land. At the same time this 

 is, so far as we know, the 

 method which nature has 

 adopted from the beginning 

 of the world to enrich the land 

 with nitrogen collected from 

 the atmosphere, at all events 

 as far as regards 99 per cent, 

 of tlie nitrogen which is pre- 

 sent on the surface of the 

 earth. Increased fodder 

 means increased stock carry- 

 ing capacity. This means 

 increased animal manures in- 

 corporated sooner or later 

 with the soil. The use of the 

 drill, which is becoming an 

 essential part of every system 

 of cultivation, allows the 

 water soluble phosphoric acid 

 to be placed in such close 

 proximitv to the seed that the 

 little plant is able to get its 

 earliest essential nourishment 



