SHALLOW SANDY SOILS USEFUL 47 



ising garden materials, even though the layer be too shallow for 

 the growth of trees. Many fruit growers are struggling to main- 

 tain trees on such spots in their orchards when they should forsake 

 the effort and by adequate use of water and manure turn such 

 spots into family gardens. The holding of water near the surface, 

 which is fatal to tree roots, is the opportunity for the growth of 

 most vegetables. Depth of soil which is so strongly insisted upon 

 in treatises on gardening, constitutes a storehouse of moisture and 

 plant food, but it has been abundantly demonstrated the world 

 over that depth is not essential provided the plant is otherwise fed 

 and watered. California gardens proceeding upon rainfall alone, 

 need a deep, retentive soil ; the irrigated garden may thrive upon a 

 soil too coarse to be retentive providing it has a tight bottom to 

 hold moisture within reach of shallow rooting plants. Therefore 

 reclaim such sand by providing a home water supply, if not in an 

 irrigated region, and use plenty of well-composted and decayed 

 manure, which will not only feed the plants but will also reform its 

 texture and transform the coarse sand into a rich garden soil, kind 

 in cultivation and prodigious in its yield of succulent vegetables, 

 for sand is best of all materials for free and rapid root development. 

 The treatment of such soil is directly opposite that prescribed 

 for adobe. All coarse materials must go through compositing, 

 which will be described in another chapter. The garden should be 

 cleared of all its own coarse refuse and only fine compost or com- 

 mercial fertilizers used upon it. Both of these act benignly upon 

 its texture. 



