38 SOILING CROPS AND THE SILO. 



The latter will grow best, therefore, on loam 

 soils which are well supplied with humus, and which 

 rest on a subsoil of readily permeable clay. All, or 

 nearly all, prairie soils are well suited to the growth 

 of sorghum. But the most suitable soils for this 

 plant have more of the sand element in them than 

 those which possess highest adaptation for growing 

 corn. Sorghum may also be grown with success in 

 sandy soils underlaid with sand or gravel and so 

 lacking in moisture that corn could not be success- 

 fully grown upon them. On the other hand, in the 

 dry belt there are vast stretches of just such land 

 which are so lacking in moisture that sorghum even 

 cannot be grown on them in the absence of irrigation. 

 On certain other soils, as, for instance, clays of more 

 or less fineness of texture, corn may be grown to bet- 

 ter advantage than sorghum. The former will suc- 

 ceed measurably well on clays so stiff as to be quite 

 unsuited to the growth of sorghum. 



Place in the Rotation. When sorghum for 

 soiling is the only crop grown on the land during 

 the season of growth, it may be placed anywhere in 

 the rotation, but preferably between two grain crops, 

 as then it can be grown as a cleaning crop. Its effi- 

 cacy for such a use will depend much upon whether 

 it is or is not cultivated while growing. In either 

 case, when the land is properly handled weed growth 

 will be diminished. Sorghum may also be grown 

 as a catch crop, but not to the same extent as corn, 

 since some varieties of corn may be grown in a 

 shorter period than any of the varieties of sorghum. 

 When thus grown, however, it may frequently be 

 made to follow such crops as winter rye, whether 



