PUTTING THE SOIL IN CONDITION 119 



increased, and the securing of a seed bed most 

 favorable for the growth of plants; and such a 

 seed bed is one that holds sufficient moisture, air 

 and heat, that chemical and germ action will take 

 place therein, that plant food be prepared for 

 growing crops. 



There are times when the doctor of human ills 

 requires his patients to wrap themselves with 

 quilts and comforts that all parts of their bodies 

 may be protected from drafts that certain con- 

 ditions may be obtained so that the medicine ad- 

 ministered to the patient may be efficacious. It 

 is the same with soil doctoring. Sick soils need 

 to be covered with cover crops so that certain con- 

 ditions necessary to soil maintenance and restora- 

 tion be obtained. Nature is a lavish user of cover 

 crops and is persistent in her efforts to cover 

 naked soils by the growth of weeds, grasses and 

 trees, thus teaching us a valuable lesson in soil 

 covering. 



A cover crop is one like grass, rye, clover, vetch, 

 hungarian, buckwheat, or any close lying herbage 

 and thickly rooted plant, whose mission is to pre- 

 vent soil from washing, blowing away, puddling 

 and cracking, and to prevent ammonia wastes by 

 evaporation and the loss of nitrogen ; and its fur- 

 ther mission is to produce the mellow texture of 

 the soil and to bring about all those conditions 

 characteristic of new and virgin soils. Like the 

 doses of drainage, organic matter, plowing, etc., 

 the dose of cover crops must be large or the "soil 

 doctor ' ' will see but little improvement in his pa- 

 tient of sick soil. 



The "soil doctor,/' while administering all the 



