PASTURE CULTIVATION

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22539, 2 October 1936, Page 17

PASTURE CULTIVATION

ADVANTAGE OVER PLOUGHING Following thorough grassland cultivation, pastures which are running out ■"an bo rejuvenated almost more effectively than where they axe ploughed This is so partly because a considerable proportion of the better grasses survive the drastic tearing about which such a field should be given, but chiefly because the consolidation of the soil is not seriously disturbed, nnd grass, to be permanent and flourishing, must liavo n well-consolidated soil Thero is another very cogent reason nbv surface cultivation is superior to ploughing for the establishment of grass, and this is because the former encourages but does not bury, and t-o temporarily put out of action, the bacteria on which soil fertility depends. For this reason ploughed land should invariably be fallowed for some months prior to its being sown down in a comparatively shallow-rooted crop, such as grass. L'his permits of the re-establish-ment of bacteria on the surface. Deeper rooting crops such as turnips, swedes and potatoes are the only ones which will really thrive '"on newly-ploughed iiass or fern-land, because their roots net down to the strata fertilised by the bacteria before it was turned under by the plough, also, of course, their roots penetrate sufficiently deeply to tap a constant supply of moisture from the soil below that which has been broken up in cultivation.