THE BULB BOOK 



proportion of lime. Such a soil will be easy to dig or trench ; will 

 retain a sufficient amount of the necessary moisture without 

 becoming water-logged with sour and stagnant liquid ; and will give 

 generally good results. According to the different kinds of plants 

 grown, however, it may have to be modified in places to meet certain 

 peculiarities. Thus, the addition of more peat or leaf soil may be 

 necessary for some plants, while more sand, grit, loam, or clay may 

 be required for others. 



For true bulbous plants, anything savouring of wet, heavy, clayey 

 soil is unsuitable. It is cold, wet, and stodgy, and very difficult to 

 turn over. But if bulbous plants are to be grown in such a soil, 

 turned over it must be, and that to a depth of 2 or 3 feet into 

 the bargain. To bring a heavy, wet, clayey soil into anything like a 

 proper tilth, it should be trenched about 3 feet deep, bringing the 

 soaked and soddened bottom soil to the surface, there to be relieved 

 of its sour and superfluous moisture, and to have its clods and 

 particles sweetened and broken down by exposure to the weather. 

 Very few people possess the courage to do this; and the great 

 majority speaking with all the confidence of those who have never 

 done such a thing will at once condemn the operation as being 

 unsound both in theory and in practice. Rather than do it once, 

 they prefer to be troubled for years with a cold, wet, and hungry 

 subsoil that robs the upper layer of all its heat and most of its 

 value for growing purposes. Bulbous or other plants on such a 

 miserable soil reflect its condition in their own wretched appearance. 



Where, however, a wet or clayey soil has been deeply trenched, 

 and has had a good supply of manure, and grit or sand incorporated 

 with it, a wonderful improvement takes place even in a few months. 

 The superfluous water trickles downwards to the lower regions and 

 no longer steals the sun's heat from the roots of the plants; the 

 temperature is consequently raised, and this in turn reacts upon the 

 tender living material (the protoplasm in the tips of the roots of the 

 plants). The grit will absorb the heat from the sun, and the clayey 

 particles and manure will hold it between them and prevent its rapid 

 radiation at night-time. The gases of the atmosphere the oxygen, 

 nitrogen, and carbonic acid will enter more readily into the soil, and 

 in conjunction with the rain and moisture will dissolve the mineral 

 and metallic food so necessary for the growth of plants. By day and 

 by night the temperature of a heavy soil treated in the way mentioned 

 will be more equable, being neither too hot nor too cold, nor too wet 

 or too dry. Another advantage is that there will be comparatively 



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