312 MINNESOTA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



our attending- to the water problem. While we have some lands 

 which need drainage, most of the soil of Minnesota is either enough 

 undulating or is pervious to water so as to be naturally well drained. 



Our first etf ort should be to make the very best use of the moisture 

 we now have by storing the water in the soil and once gotten in 

 conserving it there for plants to use in drouthy times. The princi- 

 pal work at Coteau Farm, our southwestern Minnesota sub-experi- 

 ment station, is along the line of getting rainfall into the soil, 

 conserving it there and finding which plantson an average give the 

 most profits. Some plants have their critical periods of develop- 

 ment, as fertilization or fruitage, in the season of greatest drouth, 

 while others may mainly develop before or after the dry season. 

 Heretofore in this experiment work, soil analyses have been made 

 to determine for comparison the water in plots of soil kept bare, 

 those kept mellow by cultivation, those bearing an uncultivated 

 crop, those bearing a cultivated crop and those otherwise cultivated 

 or mulched. This has been such a tedious, expensive and inefficient 

 method that results could not be rapidly reached. It has appeared 

 that many years would be required to get results. But a new 

 method of doing this work has been invented which seems to be 

 such a revolution that we only have to press the button and the ap- 

 paratus will give us results. To use it augur holes are bored at 

 different depths in the plots of soil and in the bottom of each hole is 

 placed an impression cell made of wood and other materials, a 

 wedge-shaped portion making it possible to firmly press the receiv- 

 ing side of the cell against the wall of earth. Several wires reach 

 from the cell to a switch board, similar to those used in a telephone 

 central office, placed in the small soil house erected near the plots. 

 By means of this switch board the various wires may be connected 

 with a recording instrument in the soil house. An ear piece such as 

 is used on a telephone is placed to the ear of the operator, and a noise 

 is heard. By carefully moving a lever on the dial of the recording 

 instrument a place is found where the sound ceases. Here the resis- 

 tance is overcome, or neutralized. By a computation from the read, 

 ings of the dial, the moisture of the soil in contact with each cell can 

 be determined. This method has been recently invented by Prof. 

 Whitney, of the Department of Agriculture, at Washington. If it 

 proves to be as efficient as is now hoped, it will enable us to study 

 the movement of a rainfall down into the soil by having cells placed 

 at various depths and records made dail}^ and then the rise of this 

 same water through capillarity can be traced. Even the condensa- 

 tion of dews in the soil maj^ prove interesting to study. The daily 

 loss of water from the bare land, land bearing wheat, laud bearing 

 a cultivated crop, land bearing weeds, land covered with a mulch of 

 straw, and the facility with which the water gets into each of these 

 soils, may be accurately traced. It may even be possible to trace 

 the amount of water the weeds will rob from the crop. 



But after we have attended to comprehensive and minute research, 

 we can hope to have only a limited control and influence in conserv- 

 ino- water in the soil. Especially is this true in case of some 

 gravelly, open, pervious soils so abundantlj' found in the north cen- 

 tral and northeastern parts of the state. The rainfall which often 



