SOILS AND MANURES 



357 



performance, therefore great care should always be taken 

 that the whole of the soil be worked deep and equally. If the 

 surface soil after trenching needs a manure dressing get it 

 on with a barrow, putting down planks on which to wheel. 

 Then spread the manure and well fork it in, and the plot will 

 then be in first-rate condition for cropping in the spring. In 



Complete trenching it is needful to throw out from the 

 first trench the entire depth of two feet of soil and of that 

 width. The bottom should then be deeply forked up and the 

 whole of the soil from the next trench of same width and 

 depth cast into it. That process naturally brings the lower 

 soil to the surface, but it may be practised with the best 

 results when the whole body of soil has become thoroughly 

 sweetened. 



Digging ground, whether with spade or fork, is a simpler 

 process, and is practised on all plots of soil not trenched and 

 between each kind of crop. 

 Light steel spades or forks 

 enable this work to be done 

 without rendering the labour 

 exhausting. But to move the 

 soil as deep as possible, say 

 twelve inches, the tool blade 

 or tines should be new and 

 long. Digging necessitates 

 opening at one end of a piece 

 of ground a trench twelve 

 inches wide and deep, and 

 casting it out ready to fill the 

 trench left when the second 

 half of the plot is done. If 

 the plot be so divided as sug- 

 gested for trenching, or if the 

 piece of ground be dug from 

 one end to the other, then the 

 whole of the soil from the 



trench must be wheeled in a barrow to the end, where the 

 digging is concluded for filling the trench. The tools should 

 be kept upright, and with the foot sent down into the soil to 

 their full length so that the movement of the ground may be 

 as deep as possible. In digging, also, the soil should be kept 

 quite even and level, as that shows good work. 



Forking is moving the soil a few inches in depth as amidst 

 growing crops, where it has become too hard or is weedy, 

 or the weeds need burying, or amongst flower beds or 

 borders. This work, if done with care, so that crop roots 



From right hand side : i. Broad-tined steel 

 digging fork. 2. Narrow-lined steel fork. 3. 

 Spade. 4. Shovel. The broad-tined fork is 

 the best for digging, the narrow-tined fork is 

 more useful for moving manure, &c. 



