AMERICAN HOME GARDEN. 23 



Strong loam or clay land, which, if plowed or dug in the 

 fall and laid flat, might be injured rather than benefited, is 

 greatly improved by careful ridging for winter, particularly if 

 lime, ashes, or manure, or all of them, be previously applied, and 

 are covered up or incorporated in the process of ridging. 



SUBSOIL PLOWING. 



In subsoil plowing, a deep furrow turned with the common 

 plow is followed by another in the same track with the subsoil 

 plow (Fig. 17, p. 39), which, being without mouldboards, simply 

 loosens the subsoil without throwing it up to the surface. The 

 convenient and obvious mode of performing it is to have two 

 teams, the one with the subsoiler following the other in its 

 rounds. 



The depth of the two furrows may easily reach eighteen 

 inches. 



TRENCH PLOWING. 



Trench plowing is performed by two teams following one an- 

 other, as in subsoiling, but with common mouldboard plows, the 

 mouldboard of the last, or trench-furrow plow, being generally 

 somewhat longer than the first. It may, however, be well done 

 with a good plow and one team, by simply plowing first to the 

 depth of nine or ten inches, and repeating the stroke in the 

 same furrow with longer gearing. It should be done with a 

 steady team, and the plow be driven as deeply as two strokes in 

 the same furrow can be made to carry it. 



TRENCHING. 



Trenching may be performed on a small or large plot with 

 equal proportionate convenience. If, therefore, it is found nec- 

 essary to the proper preparation of the garden plot, it may be 

 deferred until the fencing is completed, or even be done gradu- 

 ally through a series of years, after the garden is used. 



It consists simply in marking off from the end or side of any 

 given field or piece of land of even width a strip, say two feet 

 wide, and digging it out, and carting it or wheeling it to the 

 opposite end or side, where it must be laid in a row all along, 



