DEEP PLOUGHING IN DRY WEATHER.

Otago Witness, Issue 1921, 11 December 1890, Page 8

DEEP PLOUGHING IN DRY WEATHER.

After the harvest is cleared, and we may hope to have a measure of dry weather, on clay soils and those that will bear to have their staple deepened by deeper ploughing, would it not ba wise to try to get a little more undersoil to the top and become ameliorated by tho ensuing winter's frosts ? The Essex and Suffolk plan is the beßt both for Bummer and winter fallowing that I have seen — namely, baulks or ridges, as then a larger surface is exposed to the atmosphere. I have repeatedly seen, when the steam plough has worked in heavy clay land, large flakes of earth turned up that the plough sole has left for yearß and years past. How is it possible for plant roots to get beyond this iron substratum in search of food and moisture ? That is the real reason when in a very long drought we see plants drop their leayeß, turn sickly, finally droop, and die. This summer I have proved this in a small way. I planted some dwarf beans in old jam preserve tins with some very rich earth, putting them in a large window always exposed to the sun, giving water as requisite. I noticed— for they all bore fruit— that tha shallower the tins— for all were of different dopthß —the quicker the plants and pods turned yellow — in fact, gave vp — and so much deeper the tins were so much longer has the plant lasted. To-day I have turned out the soil and plants from the tins. At tbe bottom is a perfect network of small roots, and on pulling them out straight was surprised to find how much deeper they would have run had they not been prevented by the bottom of the tin ; and so with crops in the fields. Give them a good and open seed bed to run down through, they would thrive far better.— Correspondent Farmer and Stockbreeder.