160 One Thousand Questions in Agriculture 



fresh ashes or ashes which have been kept dry, they are chiefly 

 valuable for potash, which is good in its way, but not all that a 

 plant needs. If, however, your soil is shy of potash, the use of 

 ashes will notably improve growth if not applied in excess in the 

 caustic form in which it occurs in the ashes. They require no 

 treatment. Spread, say, a quarter of an inch thickness all over the 

 ground and dig in deeply. It may also help you by destruction of 

 wire worms and other ground pests. 



Coal Ashes in the Garden. 



What is the effect of coal ashes on the red clay soil of Redlands or 

 wood and coal ashes combined? 



Coal ashes are exceedingly desirable upon clay land because 

 their mechanical mixture with the fine particles of the clay renders 

 the soil more friable, permeable and better adapted to the growth 

 of most plants. Coal ashes, however, possess no fertilizing value — 

 their action is merely mechanical. The wood ashes which may be 

 combined with them are desirable as a source of potash which most 

 plants require. 



Liming a Chicken Yard. 



/ have a small family orchard of half an acre, fenced in as a chicken 

 yard, the soil of zvhich has become very foul. When would he the 

 best time to apply lime and how muchf 



Put on 500 pounds of lime and plow under as soon as you can 

 — that is, spread the lime just before the plowing, with a shower or 

 two on the lime before plowing, if the weather runs that way. 



Poultry Manure. 



Give directions for using chicken manure. For use of young trees, 

 is there any difference in treatment of deciduous and citrus trees? For 

 use in the vegetable garden and the flower garden, ivhat should be mixed 

 with it and in wJiat proportions? So many people say poultry manure 

 is so strong, I am afraid to use it. 



It is a fact that poultry manure, free from earth, contains even 

 as high as four times as much plant food as ordinary stable manure. 

 It is, therefore, to be used with proportional care, so that the plants 

 shall not receive too much, and particularly so that there may not 

 be too much collected in one place. Probably the best way to guard 

 against this is to thoroughly mix the manure with three or four 

 times its bulk of ordinary garden soil and then use this mixture at 

 about the same rate you would stable manure. If you do not desire 

 to go to all this trouble, make an even scattering of the manure and 

 work it into the soil. There is no reason to fear the material; 

 simply guard against the unwise use of it. It is good for all the 

 plants which you mention; in fact, for any plant grown, provided it 

 is sparingly and evenly distributed. 



