loOcT.. 1912.] Lime in Agriculture. ^S] 



on. The application of lime has been advocated in a Hght and airy way by 

 many advisers, but all sorts of confusing advice as to quantities, periodicity 

 of application, and the like have been given. Farmers, however, with that 

 conservative wisdom which is sometimes charged to their detriment, but 

 which is really their abiding safeguard against irresponsible advisers and 

 wasteful expenditure, have been loth to act on the exhortation of other than 

 dependable investigators who can advance sound research and .scientific 

 proof for their guidance. So it was with superphosphate so it will be as 

 regards lime. 



The demand of the moment, therefore, is that exact research should be 

 undertaken to demonstrate: — 



(a) the districts in which lime is likely to be generally required ; 



(b) the soils in such districts that are already in a state of lime hunger, 



or are approaching thereto ; 



(c) the varying or constant quantities, as the case may be, in which 



lime can Ije profitablv applied ; 

 {d) the profitable or economical periodicity of application ; 

 {e) the proportion in which the yields of different crops are influenced 



by applications varying or constant in amount ; 

 (/) the form of lime best suited to different crops and different soils ; 

 {g) the season and method of application ; 

 (h) the cost of varying quantities relative to resultant crop yields. 



Such work has not been previously undertaken in this State, or, indeed, 

 in Australia. There have, doubtless, been fugitive experiments carried out 

 in these directions, but the results, even when recorded, have been largely 

 estimations or opinions or guesswork. Actual weighing of yields from 

 treated and control areas, or comparative feeding off tests of results have 

 not been carried out. and without these conclusions cannot be accurate, or 

 other than speculative. 



That such work has not been so undertaken may be charged as a sin 

 against this and other State Departments of Agriculture. If so. it is not 

 desired to extenuate the neglect further than to repeat what has been already 

 said, viz. : — that the conditions of agriculture in this State have but re- 

 cently become such as to require aid in this direction, and State Govern- 

 ments are not notoriously prone to authorize expenditure ahead of require- 

 ments. 



Agricultural research is slow of process. There can be but one set of 

 observations in each year, and these subject to so great a margin of experi- 

 mental error as to be useless on which to base conclusions until they have 

 been several times repeated under naturally varying seasonal conditions, 

 particularly rainfall; so that some years must elapse before definite data 

 can be authoritatively pronounced concerning the problems for solution and 

 the questions for answer set out above. Nevertheless, belated though it be 

 (culpably so, some critics will smugly aver), a start has been made. 



During last autumn the Agricultural Superintendent (Mr. A. _E. V. 

 Richardson, M.A., R.Sc.) initiated a series of district experiments in dif- 

 ferent parts of the State, and also commenced in the North-Eastem district, 

 at the Rutherglen Viticultural Station, and in the Goulburn Valley at the 

 Wyuna Irrigation Farm, permanent lime plots designed to elucidate the 

 problems that have been indicated. These will be elaborated in required 

 directions from year to vear, and at the Central Research Farm, at Werribee. 

 they will be triplicated and extended. The objectives of these experiments 

 are indicated by Mr. Richardson in his contribution to this brochure, in the 

 article on " The Practice of Liming." 



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