32 SUCCESSFUL FRUIT CULTURE 



to one foot on the leading shoots. If they make more 

 than this growth, less fertilizer should be applied, if 

 less growth is made, then apply more fertilizer. 



GREEN MANURING OR COVER CROPS 



To supply organic matter to the soil, to retain 

 moisture and to gain nitrogen from the air and also to 

 protect the roots from severe cold during the winter 

 or drouth in summer, it is the practice of some orchard- 

 ists to grow green manuring or cover crops in their 

 orchards. The plants most used for this purpose are 

 rye, oats, barley and the leguminous plants, peas, field 

 beans, soy beans, cowpeas, crimson clover, alsike, the 

 common red clover, etc. For the general purposes of 

 fertilization the leguminous plants are the most val- 

 uable, from the fact that they organize nitrogen from 

 the air while other plants only take what nitrogen they 

 find already stored up in the soil. 



The value of any green crop for an orchard depends 

 upon the amount and composition of the crop and the 

 time when it makes its growth and can be turned under. 

 If the crop makes its growth during the latter part of 

 May and June, as with rye and spring sown oats, and 

 the clovers, the trees are often seriously injured by loss 

 of plant food and moisture when they most need it, 

 especially in a dry season. 



Rye sowoi the last of August, and joeas and oats 

 sown very early in the spring, will be in condition to 

 turn under by the last of May and, if the season is 

 fairly moist, will prove very satisfactory, but should 

 the season prove a dry one, serious injury may follow. 

 Of the other grain crops, 



Barley, sown not later than the middle of August 

 with about equal quantity of Canada or field peas (one 

 and one-half bushels of each if sown broadcast), makes 

 a good cover crop and utilizes the nitrogen of the soil 



