WHY HOEING IS BENEFICIAL

Hutt News, Volume 3, Issue 20, 9 October 1930, Page 9

WHY HOEING IS BENEFICIAL

The continuous stirring and 'breaking up of the surface »has very much, to do with the success ojp failure of many crops, and the process of hoeing should be one of the most important and regular acts in summer worlc. Hoeing prevents the growth and spread of weeds, but this is\of minor importance when considering the good that may be done' by a constant use of the handy implement. Before the real action of the 4log is described readers must remember that in" the soil there are countless myrids Of micro-organ-isms or-bacteria working there unseen, breaking up the ..humus and converting .the product-is~intj& those useful nitrates so necessary, for. pla*it\ existence. Ammonia compounds arid other nitrogenous manures are also, altered, largely. by bacteria, into the nitrate, in which form the salts are then assimilated by the. tissues of the plant, while organic •manureSj like the humus, are slowly . changed in a similar fashion. Now, these tiny organisms, which are ' the. 'best f riehds' of ,the gardener, can-

not work unless1 they can get fresh air. Q^ygen is a necessity ■ before they can livel and carry out their work in oxidising the soil content^ and then, again, any bad gases produced by t-hem must also be got rid of. The gardener who is wise^ therefore, will supply the ventilation necessary for his armies of baeteTia;:;he will.hoe arid stir the surface soil/ thus aerating the1 ground arid assisting bacterial development. Modern science recognises the great amount of. good done by the bacteria, and the up-to-dat© gardener applies the precepts of the laboratory at the edge of the •hoe. Constant tillage in ordinary garden soil means renewed supplies of nitrates, therefore it is not necessary to supply large quantities of the chemical nitrates if the hoeing is carried out systematically and regularly; that it the economic side of the matter. Hoe freely, and only add phosphates and potash (always presupposing that there is a sufficiency of humus or organic manures for the bacteria to act upon).

Hoeing has much to do with the water content of soils. Water rises through the soil by a physical phenom- ! enpri called capillarity; it is sucked .up, as it -were, to the surface, where it passes off as vapour. Compact soil facilitates the process, and the rise ofi water, and therefore ipss through evaporation at the surface, is much greater. The t-Mn layer of mulched and broken .soil formed in hoeing prevents this loss frprn continuing; it acts as a kind of instrlating layer -vtrhereby the process is checked. Thus, in a sense, hoeing counteracts the eyils of an injudicious weather clerk;, the rain falls and sinks rapidly through open soil, a*>d the loss on dry days is regulated in such a way !'that the roots are; kept in fairly equj able conditions of -humidity and tern-

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