iQTi BETTER FRUIT pa^c 6^ 



FALL BREAKING AND PREPARATION OF SEED BED 



BY S. A. KNAPP. UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE 



UPO'N the inauguratii m of the fann- 

 ers' co-operative demonstration 

 work in the Southern states it was 

 found necessary tn outline some of the 

 fundamental principles of good farming 

 and to insist that the tillers of the soil 

 should become familiar with them and 

 practice them as a first step in the better- 

 ment of farm life. These principles are 

 as follows: Prepare a deep and thor- 

 oughly pulverized seed bed, well drained; 

 break in the fall to a depth of eight, ten 

 or twelve inches, according to the soil, 

 with implements that will not bring ton 

 much of the subsoil to the surface. (The 

 foregoing depths should be reached grad- 

 ually if a field is broken with an ordinary 

 turning plow. If a disk plow is used, it 

 is safe to go to the above depths at once.) 



It is the purpose of the farmers' co-op- 

 erative demonstration work to insist upon 

 such preparation of the soil as will fur- 

 nish the best feeding grounds for the 

 roots and such as will provide at all 

 times plenty of moisture and food for the 

 growing plants. It is better to secure 

 ten or twelve inches of well drained, 

 thoroughly pulverized soil filled with 

 humus than to go deeper at the expense 

 of less thorough preparation. The pres- 

 ence of heat, air and moisture is essential 

 to chemical and germ action in the prep- 

 aration of plant food in the soil. The 

 depths to which these penetrate the soil 

 in the South depend upon the depth of 

 the plowing, provided the soil is well 

 drained. There is no use in plowing 

 down into a subsoil full of water. 



It has been proved without question 

 that the roots of plants penetrate the soil 

 deeper and feed deeper in deeply plowed 

 land. Thus, in general, it may be stated 

 that when the soil is plowed three inches 

 deep the plants have three inches of food. 



when plowed six inches deep they have 

 six inches of food, and when plowed ten 

 inches deep they have ten inches of food. 

 The fact that the bottom portions of the 

 plowed land are not as rich in available 

 plant food as the top portions shows the 

 necessity of getting more air and heat 

 down to them by deeper tillage. The 

 soil requirements most essential to the 

 growth of plants are heat and moisture. 

 Deep breaking insures air and heat at a 

 greater depth. 



For plants to do their best there must 

 be in the soil a constant supply of mois- 

 ture, so that a film of water can envelop 

 the soil particles and absorb nutritive 

 elements. The hair roots of plants drink 

 this for nourishment. If there is any 

 more than enough to serve as films for 

 the soil particles' and capillary water, 

 there is too much, and it should be 

 drained off. This can be determined by 

 digging a hole twenty inches deep. If 

 there is standing water in the bottom of 

 the hole, it indicates that there is too 

 much water in the soil or subsoil. The 

 capacity of a given soil to hold film and 

 capillary moisture depends upon how 

 finely it is pulverized and upon the 

 amount of humus in it. Unplowed lands 

 retain but little water. Thoroughly pul- 

 verized soil three inches deep cannot 

 store enough to make a good crop. 



In all Southern states there are every 

 year periods of drouth, sometimes not 

 serious, but generally sufficiently pro- 

 tracted to reduce the crop. The rem-edy 

 for this is increased storage capacity for 

 moisture. This can be accomplished by 

 deep and thorough tillage and by filling 

 the soil with humus (partly decayed 

 vegetation). The effect of deep tillage 

 has been explained. The effect of humus 

 is to increase greatly the storage capacity 



of soils for water and to reduce evapora- 

 tion. A pound of humus will store seven 

 and one-half times as much moisture as a 

 pound of sand, and the sand will lose its 

 water by evaporation three and one-half 

 times more rapidly than the humus. A 

 clay soil will store only about one-fourth 

 as much moisture as humus, and will lose 

 it by evaporation twice as rapidly. 



Plants use an enormous quantity of 

 water. An acre of good corn will absorb 

 and evaporate during its growth nearly 

 ten inches of water. About three-fourths 

 of this amount will be required during 

 the last seventy-five days of its growth, 

 or at the rate of three inches of water a 

 month. This is in addition to evapora- 

 tion from the soil, which, even with the 

 retarding influence of the dust mulch, 

 will amount to several inches each month 

 in midsummer. In case the land is plowed 

 only three or four inches deep, though 

 thoroughly pulverized, it will store an 

 amount of moisture entirely insufficient 

 to supply crop requirements in any pro- 

 tracted drouth. These shallow and gen- 

 erally poorly prepared seed beds are the 

 principal cause of the low corn yields in 

 the South, and they afifect the cotton 

 yields similarly, but not so much, because 

 cotton is a more drouth-resistant plant 

 than corn. If planting is done at all, it 

 is folly to prepare a seed bed so shallow 

 as to bring about the almost total loss 

 of the crop some years and a reduced 

 crop every year. 



Many farmers plow or cultivate their 

 corn nearly as deeply as they break their 

 land in preparing a seed bed; this leaves 

 no space for roots in the pulverized and 

 aired soil. Roots occupy a large space, 

 if all the roots of a single vigorous corn- 

 stalk were placed end to end they would 

 reach more than a mile, and if allowed 

 by the plowing they will fill the soil to 

 a considerable depth and feed in all por- 

 tions of it. In the principal corn produc- 

 ing areas of the South the annual rain- 

 fall is thirty-five inches or more, and 

 here in a soil properly prepared for corn 

 the great body of the roots will lie from 

 three to twelve inches from the surface 

 and will feed within two inches of the 

 surface if allowed by shallow cultivation. 



At the Wisconsin Agricultural Experi- 

 ment Station it was found that when 

 corn was three feet high the roots had 

 penetrated the soil for two feet, and 

 thoroughly occupied it. At maturity the 

 roots were four feet deep. At this time 

 the upper laterals were about four inches 

 from the surface. At the North Dakota 

 Agricultural Experiment Station the corn 

 roots had penetrated three and one-half 

 feet deep, and fully occupied the ground 

 ninety days after planting. At the Min- 

 nesota Agricultural Experiment Station 

 the corn roots had penetrated twelve 

 inches deep and had spread laterally 

 eighteen inches eighteen days after the 

 planting. In most portions of the South 

 nothing less than an eight-inch seed bed 

 will insure even a fair corn crop, and 

 ten inches is safer. Some soils may 

 require more. From six to eight inches 



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