36 FORAGE CROPS. 



best suited to the growth of sorghum. (See Page 16.) 

 But as sorghum has greater power than corn to 

 gather food from the soil, it is not so necessary to 

 have it in a high state of fertihty. And yet it is true 

 of sorghum, as of corn, that the return in the crop 

 will usually be proportionate to the richness of the 

 land. This is particularly true of sorghum forage. 

 But it is not so essential in growing sorghum that 

 the land shall be well stored with nitrogen as that it 

 shall be well stored with phosphoric acid and potash. 

 The idea has obtained currency that, because several 

 crops of sorghum have been grown successively on 

 the same land in certain instances, that sorghum is 

 not hard on land. That simply proves that these 

 soils possess a wonderful adaptation for growing 

 sorghum. To say that any crop which produces 

 grain, other than a legume, is not hard on land is 

 simply absurd. But since sorghum feeds more deeply 

 than corn and, moreover, since it has greater power 

 to gather food in the soil and subsoil, good crops of 

 sorghum may be grown on land too low in fertility 

 to produce good crops of corn. The best soils for 

 sorghum are free-working, moist, sandy loams 

 underlaid with a mild porous clay subsoil, rich in the 

 elements of phosphoric acid and potash. Humus 

 soils are good, but not so good relatively as for corn. 

 Hard clays lying on harder subsoils are quite unfit 

 for growing sorghum. This plant will also grow on 

 soils possessed of more or less of alkali. But,beyond 

 a certain degree, the presence of this element would 

 be fatal to its growth. 



Preparing the Soil. — It is even more important 

 with sorghum than with corn that it shall be sown on 

 land thoroughly pulverized and with moisture com- 



