PLANTING. 103 



phates, potash, lime, or magnesia. All such manures 

 are however expensive, and, with a view to recovering 

 a part of the outlay, the soil may be used for one year 

 for the production of a field crop immediately after being 

 manured. This measure is further useful, because it gives 

 the soil a change of crop, while it receives at the same time 

 a thorough working. Scotch nurserymen, as a rule, act 

 as follows : they treat their nursery-ground under a 

 a rotation of three or four years, say three, for forest 

 plants, then they manure, take off one field crop, and 

 again use the soil during threte years for nursery purposes. 



The manure can be supplied by growing a legu- 

 minous crop, such as lucerne, and ploughing it in 

 instead of removing it. 



In many nurseries considerable quantities of mild 

 manures are used, such as leaf -mould, compost, burned 

 turf, and also charcoal refuse. The leaf-mould is taken 

 from the forest, or specially prepared from dead leaves, 

 needles, forest plants, &c., which are heaped together 

 and allowed to decompose, generally with the addition 

 of a certain amount of quicklime. 



Compost is a mixture of humus and soil. It is 

 generally made into heaps, some quicklime added, and 

 then allowed to season, the heaps being turned over 

 from time to time ; it should not be used for a year or 

 two. To prevent the compost being washed out by 

 rain-water, it is sometimes stored in pits instead of 

 heaps. 



Burnt turf is produced by cutting sods of turf, best 

 from loamy soil, in spring, allowing them to dry, the 

 grassy side downwards, and then burning them in heaps 

 either alone, or better intermixed with brush-wood or 



