Making Next Year's Garden Soil Better 



HF T5TTT"T/'MVr "\T V Specialist in boil rertility 

 . T . DU1 1 U1N , IN . I . State School of Agriculture 



[Editor's Note: Now, as we stand with the season's experience behind us and the certainty of a needful season ahead, is the right time to plan 

 to bring our garden soil nearer to its maximum of -productiveness in order to secure the best returns from our labor and seeds next year.] 



THE problem of a garden soil differs 

 from that of a field soil only in its 

 intensity. In field crops the amount 

 of labor, per acre, is much smaller and 

 the interest on the land is less, making it 

 possible to secure a profit from lands of less 

 productivity. In a garden, on the other hand, 

 the amount of labor is very great and the soil 

 s usually of so much greater value, that, unless 

 the soil is kept at its maximum of fertility, the 

 overhead expenses will make the garden show 

 a net loss, instead of a profit. The problem 

 of maintaining this high level of productivity, 

 may be properly considered under three 

 headings: 



1. Physical factors, which include the 

 amount of available water, the size of the soil 

 particles, the number and size of the air 

 spaces, drainage, temperature, and color. 



2. Chemical properties of the soil, which in- 

 clude the amount of available nitrogen, phos- 

 phorus, potassium, calcium, etc. 



3. Biological factors, which include the 

 presence of beneficial or injurious animal life 

 and the proper relations of bacteria. 



The Part of Water 



'T V HE best garden soils are rather sandy in 

 -*■ texture, although this makes little 

 difference to the person whose sod happens to 

 be of clay or silt. The sandy soils are more 

 easily worked and give the more ready response 

 to the fertilizer applied. 



A good garden soil is usually rather porous, 

 and contains in the neighborhood of fifty per 

 cent, of pore space, which allows of rapid 

 movement of water and air. Soils of this 

 nature do not hold quite as much available 

 water as clay loams and for that reason every 

 effort must be made to increase the water- 

 holding capacity, as it is only the water which 

 is held on the surface of the grains in the form 

 of a film which is available to plant roots. It 

 is necessary to remove by drainage any sur- 

 plus or free water which may occur. [On most 

 Long Island soils nature has provided such 

 excellent drainage that this is not important, 

 but in other sections, the first requisite to suc- 

 cess is a series of tile drains, laid parallel, two 

 and a half rods apart and forty inches deepl. 

 Proper drainage admits air to the lower levels 

 of the soil and increases the depths of the 

 roots, and insures the crop against drouth. In 

 addition to this it enables the gardener to 

 work his land immediately after a heavy rain 

 and thus keep up with a growth of weeds, 

 which thrive as well as cultivated plants under 

 such favorable conditions. 



The Organic Matter Sponge 



"^TEXT to drainage, the most important 

 -^ factor in the control of soil moisture is 

 the presence of large amounts of organic mat- 

 ter. Just as a sponge holds more water than a 

 handful of gravel, so a soil well stored with 

 humus holds more than any texture of soil 

 which contains a less amount. 



The intensive cultivation which a garden 

 receives, permits rapid decay of this organic 

 matter, and for this reason a garden soil does 

 not long remain in the best condition of fer- 

 tility unless large applications are made of 

 stable manure, or some such cover crop as 

 crimson clover or winter vetch. As the gar- 

 den is often in use from earliest spring until 



late in the fall, it seems impractical to raise any 

 large amount of green manure, and for this 

 reason gardeners always depend upon very 

 heavy applications of stable manure to main- 

 tain the proper amount of organic matter in 

 the soil. The presence of this organic matter 

 in the soil increases the absorption of heat, 

 by making it dark in color, and raises the tem- 

 perature several degrees. The oxidation of 

 this organic matter also produces a consider- 

 able amount of heat, which has been esti- 

 mated as the equivalent of burning a ton of 

 coal per acre a season. 



The Garden Compost Pile 



/"\NE of the most ready methods by which 

 ^^ a gardener can add organic matter to 

 his soil is by the use of a compost heap. Some 

 old boards should be used to make a pen at 

 least ten feet square in the corner of the gar- 

 den, into which should be thrown all weeds and 

 parts of vegetables which cannot be used in the 

 kitchen. With this should be mixed at fre- 

 quent intervals, a few shovelfuls of rich dirt 

 from the garden. In a good sized garden there 

 will accumulate, during the summer, several 

 tons of material almost equal in value to pur- 

 chased stable manure. If the weeds are 

 pulled and thrown into this heap, the fer- 

 mentation will destroy all the seeds and as 

 many of them contain more plant food than 

 the cultivated crops, the mixture will greatly 

 increase the productivity of the garden. 



As the soil is a poor conductor of heat, this 

 organic matter also raises the temperature of 

 fertile soil above that of a less fertile one. The 

 increase of even a very few degrees of the tem- 

 perature on the soil is highly desirable in an 

 early spring, when it is difficult to get seeds to 

 sprout, or transplanted vegetables to grow 

 properly. A thorough cultivation of garden 

 soil, combined with a large amount of organic 

 matter, is important in maintaining a large 

 supply of air in the soil. This air is necessary 

 for the proper development of beneficial micro- 

 organism, and in preventing the accumulations 

 of organic acids in the soil, which is often the 

 result of imperfect decay of vegetation. 



The Part of Chemicals 



' I *HE chemical factors of soil fertility are 

 ■*• more readily controlled by the gardener 

 than physical factors, in fact most people think 

 that soil fertility consists wholly in the ad- 

 dition of large amounts of plant food to the 

 soil. While this is not strictly true it is never- 

 theless a fact that if plants are to make the 

 largest and economical growth they must have 

 present much more plant food than is actually 

 used; more than ninety-five per cent, of the 

 plant is derived from air and water which are 

 combined by the marvelous alchemy of the 

 plant into such substance as plant fibre, starch, 

 sugar, etc. The small amount of food derived 

 from the soil first is, however, of the greatest 

 importance in promoting the activities of the 

 green leaf and unless all of the needed sub- 

 stances are present, the growth of the plant 

 will entirely cease. 



The most important element from the 

 standpoint of the cost as well as from the 

 probability of its being deficient, is nitrogen, 

 which is used by most plants in the form of 

 nitrates. Nitrates may be purchased in the 

 form of nitrate of soda in whirh form the nitro- 

 gen costs about thirty cents a pound. 



86 



Unless nitrogen is present in the necessary 

 quantity, growth is slow, the color of the plant 

 is pale- and the product unpalatable and 

 stringy. If nitrate of soda is used it must be 

 applied in small amounts at frequent intervals 

 while growth is going on. Many gardeners 

 dissolve nitrate of soda in water at the rate of 

 a tablespoonful to the gallon which is quite 

 strong enough to supply the needs of our 

 plants. 



A good quality of stable manure contains 

 not more than ten pounds of nitrogen in a ton 

 and this is in a rather slowly available form. 

 When twenty or thirty tons of manure are 

 applied per acre, each year, it will supply as 

 much nitrogen as can possibly be used by the 

 vegetables, but as so many horses have been 

 replaced by motors, it is becoming increasingly 

 difficult to secure large amounts of stable 

 manure. A plot 100 x 40 ft. is almost one 

 tenth of an acre, and two two-horse loads 

 would suffice for a garden already in a state 

 of good fertility. Three two-horse loads would 

 be a heavy dressing, 



Nitrogen is of particular importance in 

 promoting the leaf and stem growth of plants, 

 particularly cabbage, lettuce, and similar 

 vegetables. Where the fruits or the seeds are 

 the desired crops larger amounts of phos- 

 phoric acid must be used which may be 

 applied in the form of acid phosphate, used at 

 the rate of five hundred pounds to the acre. 



Bone meal is a well and favorably known 

 source of nitrogen and phosphoric acid, but as 

 it is slow in its action, it is not well to depend 

 upon it for crops grown the same season. It 

 should always be used for crops like asparagus 

 or rhubarb, which remain several years on the 

 same ground. 



Now that our usual sources of potash have 

 been cut off, it is not possible for us to buy any 

 considerable amount in the form of fertilizers. 



Most of the potash in plants is contained in 

 the stems and lower leaves which makes an 

 added reason for saving unused portions of our 

 vegetables as a compost. 



Lime is needed on almost all garden soils, 

 having an especially beneficial effect on beans, 

 beets, and lettuce which are improved in yield 

 and quality by moderate applications of lime. 

 For convenience in applying, it is best to buy 

 a hydrated lime in paper sacks. A half ton of 

 this applied to an acre every second year will 

 keep the soil in good condition. 



Heavy fertilization and thorough tillage 

 always result in a heavy loss of lime in the 

 drainage water and the rapid decay of the 

 organic matter in the soil leaves a residue of 

 acids which must be neutralized if the land is 

 to maintain its fertility. 



The Part Played by Lime 



'TpHE effect of lime is as largely biological 

 ■*" as it is chemical, and a fertile garden 

 soil is an exceedingly lively place, swarming 

 with untold millions of bacteria and other 

 forms of micro-organisms, some of which are 

 injurious, others beneficial, and others of no 

 importance to us. 



We do know, however, that the most fertile 

 soils contain the largest numbers of bacteria, 

 and we know enough of their effects to be sure 

 that the production of nitrates, which are nec- 

 essary to feed the plants, is entirely due to the 

 activity of three separate groups of bacteria, 



