The: Fixation oe Nitrogen. 37 
A very large portion of this orchard, at least thirty-five acres, 
has been removed. Some of the trees may have been killed by an 
excess of water. I am fully prepared to accept this as an adequate 
and very probable cause in some cases and yet the question presents 
itself why they should have lived to be fourteen or sixteen years 
old and die several, eight or ten, years after the drains were put 
in and the water had been removed. I realize that it is exceedingly 
difficult to present all of the facts and the questions which arise 
in this connection so that persons who have never seen these con¬ 
ditions can apprehend them. But though the facts may be perplex¬ 
ing and it may be difficult to give a satisfactory reason why seepage 
should kill these trees, I am still thoroughly convinced that ex¬ 
cessive water injured some of them. This, however, does not 
apply to the greater part of this orchard. Almost, but not quite, 
the highest portion of this orchard with the deep wash, previously 
referred to, bounding the section on two sides, has suffered se¬ 
verely, in fact, several acres of it, ten or more, have been entirely 
destroyed. The trees have not been killed by winter injury, nor by 
arsenic, so far as I have been able to detect and I have tried to 
determine this point, but a great many of them have been burned 
and have died just as in the other orchards described. In the 
summer of 1909 and again in 1910 I watched the progress of the 
destruction of this orchard, marking trees in May and June to 
see them dead in August and September. 
Samples of the surface soil from the higher sandy portion 
of the orchard, where the destruction of the trees has been com¬ 
plete, gave the following results: the water-soluble equalled in 
815, 0.985, in 1061, 1.467, and in 1075, 8.590 percent of the air- 
dried sample. 
ANALYSES 
XLVI11 
XLIX 
L 
Water-Soluble 
Water-Soluble 
Water-Soluble 
laboratory 
Laboratory 
Laboratory 
No. 815 
No. 1061 
No. 1075 
June 3, 1909 
March 28, 1911 
May 2, 1911 
Percent 
Percent 
Percents 
Calcic sulfate . 
. . . 17.521 
59.460 
28.162 
Magnesic sulfate . 
. . . 27.166 
15.714 
9.470 
Magnesic chlorid . 
9.141 
Potassic sulfate . 
. . . 3.768 
3.466 
Potassic chlorid . 
3.264 
3.932 
Sodic sulfate . 
. . . 11.925 
Sodic chlorid . 
. . . 18.683 
4.540 
5.086 
Sodic nitrate . 
. . . 20.367 
13.057 
44.035 
Iron and Aluminic oxid .* . 
. . . 0.065 
Trace 
Silicic acid . 
. . . 0.505 
0.499 
0.174 
100.000 
100.000 
100.000 
Sample No. 1075 is the surface, mealy portion formed in the 
irrigating furrows after the last irrigation. This land has been 
sown to oats this year, 1911, but they are not in good condition. 
