42 THE CONNECTICUT POMOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 



that the vegetable matter not only has this influence upon the 

 plant food, but it performs one of the most important functions 

 in the soil, and that function is to give the soil a greater water- 

 holding capacity. 



I remember a few years ago we took some samples of soil 

 from a field where a crop of clover had been turned under. It 

 was turned under before the dry season came on, and that 

 orchard, I believe, during the drought that followed showed 

 about 15 per cent, of water in the soil. 



In an adjoining field we took samples from a piece of land 

 Avhere the soil was of the same general character, but in w^iich 

 no crop had been turned under, and there w^as only about 9 

 per cent, water. That is to say, the other soil had not had 

 vegetable matter turned into it. And so' I have seen it time 

 after time. Even where the land was so light that they had to 

 put a mortgage on it to hold it down, extremely sandy light 

 soil, and a soil that loses water very quickly, — I have seen those 

 soils, after being filled with coav peas, produce crops without 

 any apparent effect from drought. 



The whole thing was brought about, I believe, by giving the 

 soil a greater water-holding capacity, and by turning under 

 this green matter which increased the vegetable matter in it. 

 I cannot emphasize this too strongly. We have been cropping 

 our soils generation after generation by crop rotation, and have 

 not been supplying the quantities of vegetable matter that are 

 taken out year after year by the growing crops, and so in New 

 England, we have been burning up through successive crops 

 the vegetable matter in the soil until the soil in many places is 

 dead and hard, and does not respond so quickly to treatment 

 because of its lack of water-holding capacity. It does not have 

 the characteristics which are favorable to bacterial life, and 

 therefore it is weak in those acids, the giving off of which is 

 essential to the production of plant food. The plant food is 

 not given off so readily as in soil where the vegetable contents 

 have been continually maintained. 



I have been emphasizing this, especially in its application to 

 our fruit crops, because I believe that one of the most essential 

 prerequisites to success lies in having this vegetable contents 

 of the soil kept up through the green crops or cover crops. 

 Our soils have become depleted of vegetable matter. I am con- 



