592 THE SMALL GRAINS 



time being allowed for settling of the plowed land or the 

 decay of vegetation plowed under. Little reserve mois- 

 ture is thus provided, and in dry years the crop may suffer. 

 It is better to plow the land early in the spring and keep 

 it in condition by occasional harrowing until the crop is 

 sown. A reserve of moisture is thus provided which 

 nearly insures the crop. 



659. Fertilizers. When the soil is very poor, it is 

 often profitable to use fertilizers for the buckwheat crop. 

 Nitrogenous fertilizers should be used sparingly, but good 

 results are obtained from the use of phosphorus and potas- 

 sium. On poor, sandy soils and on rough, stiff clays the 

 addition of stable manure is advisable, but this is usually 

 reserved for other crops. Experiments by Prianishnikov 

 have shown that buckwheat utilizes undissolved mineral 

 phosphates to better advantage than do wheat and oats. 

 Pettit found that buckwheat in pot experiments absorbed 

 from a loamy soil 3J times as much potassium oxid and 

 twice as much phosphoric acid as barley. Low-grade 

 fertilizers may then be used to advantage for this crop, 

 and it would seem that rock phosphate and basic slag 

 might be profitably applied. The buckwheat crop may 

 serve as an excellent means of rendering these undissolved 

 phosphates available. 



Fertilizer tests with buckwheat made on soil of fair 

 fertility in 1901 at the Cornell Experiment Station resulted 

 in most cases in better yields of small grains following 

 fertilization with acid rock, dried blood, and muriate of 

 potash in different combinations. The results as a whole, 

 however, were uncertain and somewhat contradictory. 



660. Time of seeding. In the three states of largest 

 buckwheat production the sowing and harvesting dates 

 according to Covert (1912) are as follows : 



