FOOD FOR THE SOIL.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXVII, Issue 20563, 14 May 1930, Page 18

FOOD FOR THE SOIL.

r.v h.ii.t.

VALUE OF TOP-DRESSING

RIGHT AND WRONG IDEAS. REMOVAL OF MISCONCEPTION.

Pome "lime ago I look a journey in Company with ft farmer. Wo were strangers at the outset, but wc soon fouml ve had ft topic of mutual interest in fanning. My acquaintance was a practical man y ho' had carved bis house out, of the primeval bush and had achieved, if not wealth, at least a competence which should enable him and his wife to spend (heir declining days in comfort. He Iked of the difficult ies of (he early Jays v hen ho and his fellow-settlers had to pack their flour over miles of bush packtracks, belly-deep in mud; of the scanty education flie elder children of his family received from their wearied mother at the end of her long day's labour, when tlu-y pored over the problems of the lex 1,1 This self-reliant farmer and his wife were p-t, (he regular newspapers and penodiids dealing with the l unl and lis niai - cement, but much of it was, they sau , vi such ft purely technical nature t at thev could not follow the reasoning be31in'cl it, and, naturally afraid to adopt modern practices which they could not dearlv understand, they carried on in much" the. same way that they had found to bo profitable 20 or more years ago. FeaTS for the Future. One thing troubled this couple very much. Tbey had been willing and even ] ,ppy to hear , the privations, d.scornforts and hardships of their pioneer tfo, because always they felt that when their task was done and the land cleared and rrassed there would bo a profitable and steadily-improving property for their tv MIIS to divide and carry on But that there was an undercurrent of wony regarding this future soon impressed itselt ° £oon the truth came out. The land that, when first cleared, had carried a phenomenal number of stock per acre in rood health and productivity, was rapidly going back in carrying capacity. Hie sheep and cattle were smaller-framed and subject to sicknesses and diseases. J< ar,ll,s now did not fatten readily off the mothers. . , •Many schemes connected with improved ] breeding bad been attempted to maintain | the quality of the stock, succcsstu perhaps for a time, but the decline that tliej In "J first'noted in their original Lincoln sheep and Shorthorn cattle was now eoually: evident in the Roinney sheep and Hereford cattle, which had tr.ken their place" - f They had read and heard, of course, of the increased production following topdressing with superphosphate and other chemical manures, and had been tempted to try 'them, but ft very generally-held idea among the farmers with whom ie had discussed the matter that topdressing exhausted the land of its ler tilitv, had stayed his hand. Stimulant or Food. " How does top-dressing impoverish the land?" I asked. "Well, you see, the Super acts something like whisky does on a man," he replied. " Gives it a sort of kick along for the time being, and if Vou stick to it long enough leaves the J and a wreck. I wouldn't like to see or think of our farm going like that, and reckon it's better for the boys to carry on wit bout using it." 1 explained to him that superphosphate And other chemical manures had been conclusively proved to bo essential plant foods, and not "stimulants ; that with burning frequently he had dissipated much of the humus and potash which had originally made the land so prolific; tha in "sending Ids wool, his fat stock and his butter-fat overseas year after year without returning to the soil any of the chief minerals of which they were composed, he had exhausted the available supply of soluble phosphates, and possibly also potash and nitrogen; that there was plenty of these still left in the soil, as a chemical analysis would prove, but by making them very, very slowly soluble, Nature was keeping them as a reserve for use in future generations; and that the supply jof soluble or available mineral plant food had meantime run low, and as a result the grass, plants and through them the stock, were being starved. Feeding the Soil. Replacing these minerals in a soluble chemical form was not " stimulating the soil in the sense that intoxicants are ii stimulant to human beings; it was " feeding " the soil and, therefore, building it up rather than exhausting it. This appeared to be a new point of view to my friend, and we talked long over the many symptoms of mineral plant food exhuastion as exhibited in the growth of colour of grass, the development of livestock, and the carrying capacity of th? land. . . With his changed conception ot ttie action of chemical fertilisers this farmer is now, I believe, keen for top-dressing, the only practice that gives him hope of realising his life's ambition of holding and reinstating his farm to its foimer state of high productivity. He assured jne that most of the farmers in like plight to himself had an entirely wrong idea of the action of chemical fertilisers, and suggested this article to help them to a new point of view.