270 Practical Farming 



desired. Then, too, it has been found that many of the 

 legumes carry on their seeds the bacteria that Hve on their 

 roots, and that the mere sowing of the seed will after a 

 time fully inoculate the soil. 



This has been found true in the case of crimson clover. 

 When this clover was first sown in the far South, it was 

 found that it did not succeed and growers jumped to the 

 conclusion that it could not be grown far South. But 

 those who again sowed on the same land found that the 

 previous sowing, though a failure as a crop, had inoculated 

 the soil so that the crop succeeded. The same is true of 

 the Southern cow pea. Sown in the north it rarely 

 does well the first simimer, but if the same land is sown 

 again the following season the crop is a success. 



Then, too, it has been found that the burr-like seeds of 

 Medicago denticulata, or burr clover, as it is called, will 

 carry the bacteria that live not only on its roots, but also 

 on the roots of alfalfa, and the soil can be inoculated for 

 alfalfa by scattering the soil from a spot where Melilotus 

 alba or sweet clover has been growing as a weed. This 

 weed is abundant in most parts of the country, and es- 

 pecially on waste vacant land about the cities. But the 

 great value of the legumes, aside from their capacity to 

 get for us the free nitrogen from the air and combine it in 

 the organic matter for future crops, lies in the accumula- 

 tion and increase of the humus-making material in the 

 soil. As we have heretofore remarked, sand and clay are 

 the mere dead skeleton of a soil, humus is its life. 



In much of the farming of the past, especially in the 

 single cropping of the cotton country, the annual clean 

 cultivation and exposure of the soil to the sun has burnt 



