The Emporia news. [volume] (Emporia, Kan.) 1859-1881, 1861-04-20
FACTS FOR FARMERS.
WING AND CULTIVATION.


the plaut. When it is considered thai the
roots of wheat run down five or six feet, and
those of corn some ten or twelve feet, on
favorable soil, it might seem that no prac-
ticable amount of blowing could do them
any considerable good. But if il be true.
that the roots deep in the soil, or the tap
roots, as they may be called. are only drink
ers, or absorbents of pure water, for the
uses of the plants, while the surface roots
alone are the feeders or absorbents Of the
organic food of the plant, it will be remem
bered that most of their food, after all, must
be taken from very near the surface, fairly
within reach of the pillow; but whatever the
explanation, we know The fact, that proper
culture greatly facilitates growth. and neg
lect as greatly retards it. On given soil,
and all other things being equal, the growth
of any plant depends on due degrees OF
warmth, air and moisture about lis roots.
l say due degrees. because either too
much or little is equally fatal to the end
proposed for no roots To our common field
! plants can either grow in the fire, or in the
water, or in open spaces of air. To ensure,
therefore, these due degrees of warmth, air
and moisture, the soil should be In the high
est degree possible fine or commlnuted
deep. uniformly porous and smooth.
! The necessity of fneness arises from the
I fact that all mere Jumps of soil, from the size
of pea t. that of a mans head, are of no
more use TO growing crop than SO many
brickbats or gravel-stones, until they by
some means become fine and attriturated.
However rich in themselves, the young and
tender rootlets of the crop can make no pos
sible use of these Jumps while in that con-
dition.
The equal necessity that it should be
deep, arises not only from the fact that the
extent of the indus for the roots, i'll which
they most readily gather their food. Is d.
reclly as the depth of the stirred or cult
waited soil, but also from the equally i'm
porlant fact in our climate, that the stirred
soil operates as a mulch, 10 increase the
absorption of water both from above and
below in dry weather, and as an increase OF
effective drainage in seasons OF excessive
wet. While if the soil is not only deep and
fine. but uniformly porous, there will be no
| large air holes or rents in the soil, which are
| equally as fatal to the growth of roots, as
hard. unyielding clods; fer no tender root
will run either into an air hole in the ground
or into hard clod, or into mass of rub
bish or debris consisting of alternate clods
AMI air holes, such as is found 10 consLi-
tute, sometimes, three -fourLhs of the soil on
some of our old and ill-cultivated fields
which have been trodden into mortar, anC
worn with crops and teams, and plastereo
into Jumps and sods by our fine steel plows
for some twenty years, without ever once
having been made fine, by either roller Oh
harrow. till almost the whole soil seems wad
ded up into Jumps End clods, as really unf
for crop as the gravel banks of Nova SEQ
| tia-though holding in themselves the ma
teTials for the richest and best crop IN tEe
world. But they are all tied up. and a-
useless To the tender roofs OF tie plants as a
bale of closely pressed hay Is 10 hungry
horse-verv good If 1t was only unbound
Will his master only be kind enousb to un-
bind 1t for him, then he will eat, aud grow,
and be thankful till then, he must stanC
aud look, and nibble, and hope, and wish
and starve, just like poor hungry corn
stalk, in a lazy, shiiLless, stupid mans
old cornfield.
When a cornfeld is left all full of these
uncrushed clods, aud their necessarily con
tiguous air holes. a young rootlet frs
strikes hard clod, which II cannot pene
trate, and must therefore make an offset I,
get round it in some way; there 1t meets al
air-hole in that direction and must therefore
make another offset TO avoid that, for n,
root can grow in an air hole, however small
if too large to be kept constantly luil 0
aqueous vspor, or if II admits ot the IeasI
circulation of masses of fresh air. Now
physiolog sts we'll understand the delay an,
loss of vital energy, expended in this pro
cess of making these new offsets, In all Iormi
of organized matter. Il resembles in prin
ciple the slow attempt OF tree to form
new bud and shoot under the bark, wher,
you have cut away or stopped the growll
of the old one. Go. now, into a field o
corn thus struggling for dear life, it may b
IN the richest soil Ia the world. with a con
tinuous series of alternate clods and air
holes, and see how pale and sickly il look
IN spite of all your good weather, and al
! your steel Plows and cultivators can do 70
it; for these only turn the cobbles over ant
over, and make them more dry than before
Go again with some instrument which
will at once crush all these clods and air
holes up fine together, and stir up fine
: deep, uniform bed or indus, for all Ih
young rootlets TO shoot straight through
without offsets or hindrance, thus at one
unlocking all their natural food, and rem
dering il accessible TO them; and in on
week Time you VIII see the difference II
every row of corn thus treated, with ease
quite across the field. It will look just a
though it had been heavily MANFRED, boil
in size and color; and so it has, for oil
your old lumpy field there were ten thou
sand loads of the very richest soil that wa
locked up in these clods and Jumps and air
holes, and as totally inaccessible to the crol
as if the manure were still in the barnyard
OF course, such a trial on field already
fine, or new and in good order. could show
no such marked results on land naturally
; loose or sandy, it would show less also
But on the strong loans ard clays of thu
State. II at once becomes apparent TO tn,
most careless observer. And even man,
forms of sand are too loose for the best cul
tivation, till they are compressed by tn
roller; that is, the Interstices between th
| PARTICLES of earth admit too much air, AM
!; therefore need pressing, to close the exces
ot air out. just as the clods above name,
needed pressing and crushing, TO let the al
? IN, because there was tno liIIle insiie-ro
We should remember thar the roots of plant
want only due degrees. Beither 100 nueh q
too little, either OF air or of moisture. An