Green Manuring.

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume XXIX, Issue 8277, 19 October 1905, Page 7

Green Manuring.

In the Journal of the British Board of Agriculture attention is called to the custom of green manuring, which has rather fallen into disuse in recent years. On any kind of soil this has been done, and its effects in reclaiming some of the light.sandy ground on the Continent, have been marvellous. In recent years great improvements have taken place in the ideas on the same. Since the discovery of the nitrogen-fixing power of leguminous plants, only this class of crop has been grown, and beans, peas, vetches, lupins, serradella, clovers, etc., are those now in use. On drifting sands the lupin has been used with beneficial effect to a large extent on the Continent, and the writer has seen it succeed in Ayrshire on a similar formation. As a general rule, however, vetches are one of the most convenient crops for the purpose, though a mixture of vetches, peas, and beans would suit equally well. Non-leguminous plants, such as rape, mustard, hemp, etc., are now out of the running altogether, as they do not enrich the soil the same as the others at all. In the writer's neighbourhood red clover and crimson clover come in usefully in this way, even

when cut for hay or grazed off, as there is

always a lot of "stuff to plough in afterwards. object of this ploughing in of a crop is, course, two-fold ; to add to the humus or organic matter in the soil, and to enrich it as well. It therefore tends to lighten up a heavy clay soil, and add to the "staple" of a light sandy one. If the crop is allowed to grow up, say, a foot high, before ploughing in, and is not buried too deeply, then it is as good as a heavy dressing of dung per acre without the labour of carting and spreading, while it tends to clean the land at the same time.