TWENTY-SIXTH SESSION. 
85 
of clover is sown about August and worked into the soil the next April or 
early in May. 
Cow peas and crimson clover are also highly beneficial in the vineyard. 
Within the past few weeks I saw some most remarkable examples of this 
character about Southern Pines, N. C. The vineyard of the Experiment Sta- 
tion of the North Carolina Horticultural Society there had had rows of cow 
peas planted in them on certain plots and with the most astonishing re- 
sults in the way of growth. Every plot that had been so treated could 
be picked out at a glance. The vineyard of Dr. B. von Herft a few miles 
distant, which had an extent of many acres had all been treated in the same 
way and was a picture of health and vigor. It is true that chemical fer- 
tilizers had been used on it also, but they contained almost no nitrogen, 
the cow peas supplying that ingredient. Although the lands upon which 
both these vineyards stand was naturally about the poorest in America, 
being poorest of the poor sandy pine lands of the South, yet better looking 
and more productive vineyards I have never seen this side of California. 
The clusters were large and the grapes of the best flavor of their kind. 
The soil looked dark, compared with that not so treated, because of th^ 
humus it contained. 
In some of the vineyards of Virginia and farther north the same plan 
has b^en followed with very great benefit. It has also been tried to some 
extent, especially with crimson clover, on fields of bush fruits. Raspber- 
ries, blackberries and currants have been stimulated in growth by sowing 
it in the late summer and early fall and working it under the next spring. 
Common red clover is also a good crop in an orchard. The Wellhouse 
apple orchards in Kansas are sown to clover after the first five or six years, 
and some of them have not been plowed for ten or more years afterwards. 
The clover is allowed to grow uninterruptedly, and each summer the crop 
of clover, weeds and all that grows between the trees is mashed down 
and cut into short pieces by a peculiar sort of rolling cutter. Everything 
is left to rot on the ground. No chemical fertilizers have so far been used 
on these orchards, the land being mostly rich, virgin prairie. This method 
seems to work very advantageously and cheaply. 
It is a good plan to sow common clover in bearing apple and pear 
orchards, and after two or three years, plow it under. It does not make a 
compact sod like grass, nor does it draw so largely on the moisture and 
fertility of the soil. Of course there should be nothing taken off the land 
in the w'ay of forage; because this would decrease both the fertility and 
the humus in the soil. 
In the orange orchards of Florida it is a common practice with some 
to grow cow peas or beggar weed, and for the same reasons that have been 
mentioned in regard to other orchards. 
As nitrogen induces a rank, leafy growth, which is more necessary in 
the production of forage crops and vegetables than in fruits, there is dan- 
ger of excessive applications of nitrogenous fertilizers. They should be used 
knowingly and with caution. It is also possible to add too much nitrogen 
to the soil by means of the soiling nops just mentioned. I have seen if. 
done. Not more than two or three crops of such should be grown in suc- 
cession on ordinary lands. After a year or two of rest, they may be re- 
peated, giving thorough tillage in the mean time. 
If nitrogen is applied to fruits in commercial fertilizers the forms that 
yield it up slowly are better than such readily soluble forms as nitrate 
