PREPARATION OF GROUND 99 



at some period of the day may not hurt them ; but the 

 ground must not be overhung by large trees, or it will 

 be found that not only will the tops shade the Peas too 

 much, but the tree roots will rob the soil of nourishment 

 required by the Peas. For autumn sowing the ground 

 must be trenched early in September, but for those Peas 

 raised in pots for planting out in the spring it need not 

 be trenched until later. In fairly light soils any time after 

 November will do, as a little consolidation afterwards will 

 not hurt ; but for heavy, retentive soils, which during rains 

 are apt to run together again, the months of January and 

 February provide the best time. The trenching should 

 be done at least three spits deep, and when the subsoil 

 is heavy and close, plenty of opening material, such as 

 leaves, sweepings from the flower-garden, wood-ashes, and 

 old lime rubble, may be worked in. Do not put the 

 materials in layers, but incorporate them with the soil. 

 In the bottom and second spit plenty of good, rich 

 manure should be utilised. Manure from the cow-yard or 

 bullock pens is very good, or, if it could be procured from 

 a butcher who kills his own cattle and throws the blood 

 over the manure heap, this will be better still, and will not 

 need to be used in quite such large quantities. Failing 

 these, however, ordinary stable manure will answer admir- 

 ably ; but neither must be left in layers in the trench, for 

 once the roots get into large quantities of it they will stay 



