CHAPTER VI 



HOLDING AND INCREASING THE FERTILITY 

 OF THE SOIL 



THERE is no one thing that the gardener 

 so needs to keep always in mind of more 

 importance than that the soil needs additional fer- 

 tility; it does not matter how good it may have 

 been originally or how good it was last year; this 

 year it must have returned to it the food that was 

 taken from it last year by the crop that was grown 

 upon it. Any soil that is not virgin soil — soil that 

 has never been used, and that sort of soil is not 

 available in towns and villages if, indeed, it is 

 anywhere in an old, settled country like ours — 

 must have returned to it, year after year, an equi- 

 valent of the fertility extracted from it in grow- 

 ing the previous season's crop. It may be that 

 the loss of many seasons must be made good, it 

 may be that the soil was originally deficient in 

 many, or only one, of the elements that make fer- 



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