September, 1009.] 



268 



Miscellaneous. 



must be paid at rates approximating to 

 those which prevail locally. The urgent 

 need of the co-operative principle as a 

 help to the peasant is shown by the uses 

 to which the Societies put their funds. 

 They are not yet, we gather, in a position 

 to lend for the purpose of enabling their 

 members to buy improved implements 

 or to purchase seed at wholesale rates. 

 The repayment of old debts and the 

 purchase of cattle are now the common 

 objects of borrowing — a fact which 

 throws a flood of light on the financial 

 incumbrances of the ryot. 



WATER IN AGRICULTURE. 



(From the Louisiana Planter and Sugar 

 Manufacturer, Vol. XXXXlL, No. 16, 

 April, 1909.) 



In a recent able editorial in the North- 

 western Agriculturist, the use of water 

 in dry agriculture was discussed, and 

 incidentally such references were made 

 to the use of water in agriculture as 

 would interest us in this country, where 

 we have so considerable a rainfall. In 

 the extreme north-west parts of the 

 United States summer fallowing is done 

 to a considerable extent. We had been 

 taught to think that summer fallowing, 

 which was an old method of destroying 

 weeds, would also destroy the land by 

 the incidentalexposure of the bare land 

 to the sun and the volatilization and loss 

 of its contained ammonia. In the edi- 

 torial referred to the point is brought 

 out that such summer fallowing, taken 

 together with the deep ploughing and the 

 absence of any growth on the laud, 

 results in the conservation of a consider- 

 able amount of water that would other- 

 wise be dissipated into the air without 

 useful effect. In order that the water 

 shall be conserved in the summer time 

 it is held that the top of the fallow land 

 must be in fine tilth, or have a dust 

 blauket, as its covering, which will 

 break the lines of evaporation and 



result in the retention of the water in 

 the soil. 



Next, the destruction of the weeds in 

 the land would result from this process 

 of fallowing, and where there is any 

 scarcity of water it is held that the 

 land must be kept free of weeds, as 

 every weed or plant out of the place 

 uses up the water that is so much needed. 

 Such plants are parasites living on the 

 water that should be retained in the 

 land for its betterment and for the use 

 of subsequent industrial crops. The 

 conservation of the water demands the 

 mulching of the land at the surface and 

 the destroying of all weed growths. 



Here in Louisiana we frequently find 

 fall planted cane injured by the very 

 considerable growth of winter weeds, or 

 grasses as we ordinarily term them, and 

 unless these weeds are removed in due 

 season, the fall planted canes are fre- 

 quently killed. We thought for some 

 time that this disaster was brought 

 about by the shading of the land and 

 the retention in the land of an excess of 

 moisture during the winter season. On 

 the other hand, all plant physiologists 

 admit that wherever a plant is living on 

 the land it makes the land drier than it 

 otherwise would be. The action of the 

 sun on the leaves of the plant produces 

 a constant evaporation, and the water is 

 pumped out of the soil so positively and 

 so continuously that it is now generally 

 admitted that land covered with weeds 

 is drier than the same land left bare, 

 and much drier than the same land if, 

 in addition to being left bare, it was care- 

 fully mulched at the surface. 



We were quite struck with the use of 

 the word "parasite" as applied to weeds 

 or plants out of place, in our fields, their 

 parasitism consisting in their consump- 

 tion of the water needed by the growing 

 crop. We seem to have a good many 

 things to learn concerning plant life, 

 just as our most skillful doctors seem to 

 have yet a good many things to learn 

 concerning our human lives, 



