140 The Principles of Fruit-growing. 
soil and the conservation of the moisture, for if the 
cultivator is skilled in these latter matters, all the 
other benefits will follow. 
The texture of the soil.—The texture or physical 
condition of the soil is nearly always more important 
than its mere richness in plant-food. That is, the 
productivity of land is not determined wholly, and 
perhaps not even chiefly, by the amount of fertiliz- 
ing elements which it contains. This is particularly 
true of all lands—like the clays—which tend to be- 
come and to remain hard and unpleasant if left to 
themselves. Plant-food is of no consequence unless 
the plant can use it. The hardest rocks may con- 
tain various plant-foods in abundance, and yet plants 
cannot grow on them. A stick of wood contains 
potassium and phosphorus and nitrogen, and yet 
nothing grows upon it until it begins to decay. A 
hundred pounds of potash in a stone-hard lump is 
worth less to a given plant than an ounce in a 
state of fine division. Soils which the chemist may 
pronounce rich in plant-foods may grow poor crops.* 
In other words, the chemist can not tell what a soil 
will produce; he can only tell what it contains. 
All this is not surprising, when we come to think 
of it. Every good farmer knows that a hard and 
lumpy soil will not grow good crops, no matter how 
much plant-food it may contain. A clay soil which 
has been producing good crops for any number of 
years may be so seriously injured by one injudi- 
* See, for example, Bull. 119, Cornell Exp. Sta. 
