SOILS, FERTILIZERS AND IRRIGATION 79 



lime in advance of your irrigation after fruit picking. Caustic lime 

 acts on texture more quickly and effectively than ground limestone. 

 Other ways to improve texture are to use stable manure and grow 

 cover crops also to watch and work the soil when it crumbles best. 

 You can use 500 pounds of lime per acre and keep doing it for two 

 or three years. 



Supplementing Stable Manure. 



What is the best commercial fertilizer for light, sandy soil? I have 

 not enough manure to cover all the ground this fall. 



Theoretically at least, the best way to use a limited amount of 

 stable manure is to spread it more thinly and use with it a complete 

 commercial fertilizer, which approximates its composition. Good 

 practice is to grow a cover crop with fall and winter rainfall and to 

 apply the fertilizer to push the growth of the cover crop, or to scatter 

 the commercial fertilizer on the cover crop and plow the two in to- 

 gether. Nitrate of soda is also used to stretch out stable manure, 

 but it should be applied toward the end of the rainy season usually, 

 although of course it may be used to push a winter growing crop. On 

 land not covered with plants to use it, nitrate should not be used while 

 there is too much water moving to carry it away. 



Nitrate in Tree Planting. 



We are setting a young orchard on land rich in phosphoric acid 

 and potash, but lacking in humus and nitrogen. We wish the trees 

 to make a good start. Will nitrate of potash (of which we happen to 

 have a supply on hand) give the desired effect? How much sfiould\ 

 we use per tree? 



If you are sure that your soil is too poor to grow a young tree, 

 which is not often true, it is rational enough to use nitrate, and nitrate 

 of potash is better than nitrate of soda. It is dangerous to put 

 nitrate in the hole with the tree because of the chance of its not being 

 mixed with enough earth. You might safely mix a small handful in 

 the loosened earth in the bottom of the hole, then fill and pack around 

 the roots with fine earth without nitrate and scatter a little more 

 nitrate on the earth which you are to use in finishing the fill. If you 

 wish to take all that trouble you could safely use a quarter of a pound 

 to the tree. It would, however, be altogether better to plant without 

 nitrate and then if, when it has water and cultivation enough, the tree 

 does not grow to suit you, make a surface scattering of half a pound 

 of nitrate to the tree and let it go in with irrigation water and follow- 

 ing cultivation. 



Dissolved Nitrate for Flowers. 



In applying nitrate of soda to flowers, can I dissolve it in water; 

 some say it will burn the plant? 



Nitrate is largely used by florists at the rate of one teaspoonful 

 to three gallons of water. If scattered over the surface, before rain 



