PLOW BOTTOMS 99 



world. This soil is nearly always of a waxy, putty 

 nature and holds water much the same as an earthen 

 basin. For this reason tiling or draining has never been 

 successful, hence a plow bottom to successfully turn this 

 soil must turn a furrow well over, yet let it stand on a 

 corner of the furrow slice and leave small crevices or 

 sub-surface ditches on the bottom between each furrow. 

 This gives excellent drainage so that the sharp top 

 corner of the furrow can soon dry and crumble, leaving 

 a few inches of soil on the surface that can be worked 

 to bring about the condition necessary for the right 

 mixture of air and moisture for plant growth. 



Prairie sod is full of grass roots and decayed vegeta- 

 tion. This ground is plowed to start the decaying of 

 grass as rapidly as possible. The ultimate object of 

 such plowing, of course, is to put the ground in a con- 

 dition of tilth for the successful growing of crops. The 

 rotting of the grass being the first step the sod should be 

 plowed to bring this about in the quickest possible time. 

 In most soils the complete reversing of the sod is sup- 

 posed to smother the stems and leaves of the grass so 

 they rot and decay very rapidly. This must be done 

 in a way to prevent new stems from springing up. 



The success of this process depends upon plowing the 

 ground at a season of the year when there is moisture 

 enough to start rapid decay or a much longer time than 

 should be necessary will be consumed in the complete 

 decomposition of the sod. The discussion on capillary 

 water explains why this is necessary. 



The thing to remember is that regardless of the kind 

 of grass the plant must be prevented from putting forth 

 new stems and leaves which, as is mentioned in a pre- 

 vious chapter, all plants will do when air and moisture are 



