Vol. LXXI. No. 4176. 
NEW YORK, NOVEMBER 9, 1912. 
WEEKLY, $1.00 PER YEAR 
ASKING QUESTIONS OF THE SOIL. 
The Answers Are True. 
In the Spring of 1909, the writer was induced 
to make an experiment outlined by Professor Milton 
Whitney of the United States Bureau of Soils. This 
experiment is described in Circular No. 18 of the 
Bureau of Soils, United States Department of Agri¬ 
culture. It was our intention to find out whether we 
could obtain, through such a pot test, practical re¬ 
sults that would show the best method of sowing 
Alfalfa on our farm in the Chester Valley, Chester 
County, Pennsylvania. 
This experiment in brief was to test the actual soil 
constructed wire pots. The comparative growth of 
seeds in these pots, each representing a different 
method of fertilization, would disclose, in a few 
weeks, at a trifling expense, what would take months 
of time and much more expense in field tests. Pro¬ 
fessor Whitney says “The results that we get with 
these small pots in two weeks give the order of the 
differences that they have got with the different 
fertilizers over a period of 10 years.” 
This experiment showed the two most important 
requirements of our soil. One was the need of lime 
and the other was a corollary to this, the need of 
bacteria in the soil. Now it happens that in our 
locality farmers often ask why we need to lime our 
carbonate or lime has been leached out, leaving a soil 
which requires lime. In the alkaline soils of the 
West, on the other hand, the limestone rocks were 
ground up by the glaciers, and the small particles of 
such rock are found all through the soil, mixed up 
with the earth, making a sweet or alkaline soil in 
which the lime has not been leached out. 
In his interesting book on “Agricultural Bacteri¬ 
ology,’’ Dr. H. W. Conn, of Wesleyan University, 
says, “We have learned how necessary is the activity 
of the soil bacteria in the transformation of plant 
foods, and how, as a rule, bacteria cannot grow in 
the presence of the slightest acid reaction. As the 
activity increases the bacterial action declines and 
A FIELD OF ALFALFA IN CHESTER CO., PA., GROWN AFTER 
ASKING QUESTIONS OF THE SOIL 
of the farm under varying conditions of fertiliza¬ 
tion in anticipation of growing Alfalfa. Experiment 
stations and some progressive farmers test the soil 
in their fields by devoting several plots of ground 
to the crop under test, fertilizing each plot in a dif¬ 
ferent manner, and judging from the yield in forage 
and grain which system of fertilization is best for 
that crop in that field. The objection of the average 
farmer to these so-called field tests is that they are 
comparatively expensive and that years must pass 
before the result of the test can be known. Professor 
Whitney’s substitution for field tests is a method by 
which soil from the field in question, treated to as 
many systems of fertilization as are desired for the 
experiment, is put into a number of small especially 
fields, inasmuch as our land is underlaid with lime¬ 
stone rock, and until this experiment was made, this 
seemed a reasonable question. Our test showed, how¬ 
ever, that lime was required, and as bacteria cannot 
live in an acid soil, the absence of lime would mean 
the lack of bacteria. In discussing the results ob¬ 
tained by our tests with Professor Whitney, Chief 
of the Bureau of Soils of the Department of Agri¬ 
culture at Washington, he said the experiments proved 
for our locality what was known generally of lime¬ 
stone soils in the East, as compared with the alkaline 
glacial soils of the West. 
In the East the soils over the limestone have been 
formed by the erosion of the rock and the decay 
of vegetable matter, and in this process the calcium 
fertility correspondingly diminishes. The addition of 
lime to such soils is necessary, therefore, to reduce 
the acidity. Other needs there may be for lime, but 
the primary one is to keep the bacterial activities in 
the soil at a high state of activity.” Therefore we 
find that our soil being acid, bacterial growth will 
be lacking. As shown by our test therefore, we have 
to inoculate the soil. 
It will be apparent, therefore, that each farmer 
will have different soils and different conditions under 
which he has to grow his crops. Therefore, what 
would be more logical than for each farmer to find 
out the requirements of his own soil for the crop to 
be planted by such an inexpensive and short test? 
Our own experiment showed such a wide variation 
