Perrysburg journal. (Perrysburg, Wood Co., O. [Ohio]) 186?-1965, 1870-07-15
FARM AND HOUSEHOLD
Clover.

Clover
CLOVER is a great Institution, the value
of which is not az fully understood as it |
should be. The field for its development
is the prairies of the West, where the fer
tility of the sou Is annually depreciating
for want of manurial matter 70 supply
the drain that Is made upon IL
When there is but little stock in pro-
portion TO the number of acres cultivated,
and that little is not stabbed in winter,
| large amount of manure ecaEnot be saved
to enrich the broad fields of corn and
wheat What shall be doneP Two. thirds
of the fertility, so far as wheat is concern
ed, is lost already. Soils that few years
since yielded thirty three bushels now
| yield eleven. The remedy is forthcoming
Just when 1t Is wanted, and experience is
teaching how to use it. 1t is wonderful
| how nature keeps her treasures stored up
until the necessities of man compel him
to seek for them. Coal has been buried
in the bosom Of the earth until man
wants it to convert water into steam, and
iron ore into rails and ships, and now he
| finds 1t cropping out all over the earth.
The fertility accumulated in the virgin
soil has suf1ced for one generation, and
| now the little brown clover seed has been
| given to furnish machinery by which the
elements of fertility may be absorbed
from the atmosphere, and pumped out Of
the earth to supply the wants of another
generation. On most lands four or five
! pounds of clover seed and two or three
hundred pounds of plaster to an acre,
| will in little more than year, il the soil
is tolerably good, be converted into two
tons of the very best hay. This material
has been chiefly derived from the atmss.
phere by the plants which have the pow
er of changing carbon and oxygen into
solid matter in their stems and leaves.
This they deposit in the soil when they
have completed their growth and fall and
decay, and thus fertilizing matter is drawn
from the atmosphere by the ton, annually,
and placed just where it is wanted for the
next crop. ,-------..-...----4- --4-.----.---...-.
/ And the clover roots, yes, clover roots
what have they been doing all this
timer If not interrupted they work on
two years, and then withdraw from the
field to make room for other workers who
succeed them. We call them biennials,
indicating that they take two years jobs
But what an amount of work they do in
this short time. They will push them
selves into the soil, one, two, three, four,
and five feet, burrowing into and loosen
ing 1t, pumping up water from it, and the
various minerals held in solution, and de-
posting them in the stems of the plants,
! along with the materials drawn from the
atmosphere, and thus we have a compost
of silex, lime, potash, soda, magnesia,
alum, iron, and the rest, mixed with car
bon, oxygen, nitrogen, etc, as food for the
next crop. These clover roots are grand
workers. They are no idlers. They do
not stop when they have worked eight
hours. When one of these little fellows
finds particle of lime or sulphur, away
down three or four feet under ground, he
seizes 1t as his lawful prey-indeed it is
the very thing he went down after, and
has been hunting after all summer,-and
now he sucks it into his open mouth, and
pulls and tugs like boa constructor swal-
lowing goat, until he gets it within his
psophagus, then he pushes it on and on
through the four or five feet of his longi-
t1de, and deposits it in the stem of the
plant to be used where it is wanted in the
process OF construction. We should like
TO see all the roots from an acre of thrifty
clover washed and shook out, dried and
thrown into heap. Would there be two
tons of them, as much as there is of the
plants above ground? If so, these four
or five POUNDS of seed would have drawn
from the air and the ground four tons of
solid matter, ready to be rotted down into
plant food for the crops that are to follow.
Not only has this amount of manurial
matter been prepared, but the soil has
been bored and loosened in all directions,
so that the air could penetrate it and
warm it. and act upon the mineral matter
it contains. This soil is then in a very
different condition from what it was when
the clover seed was sown. Its mechani-
cal condition Is greatly changed. The rain
can penetrate it. The roots of wheat can
run down into it. The decaying vegeta-
Bile matter upon the surface, as it dissOlves
by the rain, can accompany the roots into
the earth, anu yield up to them the nour-
ishment 1t contains.
If the soil is too poor, or too much ex.
hausted to yield full crop of clover at the
first sowing, plow it into the ground, and
repeat the process. The crop will be in
creased, and the soil improved by every
repetition, until at length you will get the
thirty bushels of wheat.
But we are impatient. We want to get
the 30 bushels in one year. We cannot
wait. But Providence is patient. " The
mills OF the gods grind slow" We must
wait. Gusno at $50 a ton, and then
transported thousand miles, won't pay,
and If it would pay one year, it will leave
the land in worse condition than it foun
1t. We must make the manure on the
soil where it IS TO be used. We can get
labor when we cannot get manure. We
must put as much labor on ten acres as
we now put on twenty, and we shall get
more wheat, and more corn, and improve
the soil ms cad of exhausting it. Wemust
raise clover.-Nes0 England Farmer.