Shenandoah herald. [volume] (Woodstock, Va.) 1865-1974, 1876-07-13
PREPARING FOR FALL SEEDING.

PRES ARING EoR FALL SEE DING.
Where regular system of rotation
is pursued, i. e., corn, oats, wheat, clover
and timothy, the following mode of
preparing for the wheat crop viii be
found to yield the happiest results As
soon as the oats are harvested, and the
bright and shining stubble invites the
pillow, the invitation should be accepted
aud the stubble turned under before the
ground becomes dry and hard beneath
the hot suns of August. Thus plowed
the soil loosely rests on stratum of
vegetable matter composed Of the
stubble and fibrous roots, through
which the atmosphere and dews will
permeate, and the mineral as well as
organic constituents of such material
yield more readily to sthes general
influences Of such aeration than if the
blowing were deferred to later period.
With us oats have ever been a
favorite crop, having in all our long
experience found wheat to succeed bet
ter after oats than on a clover sod, or
after any other crop, except, perhaps,
tobacco and for this reason, if for no
Sether, they should find a place in every
rotation.
But in preparing any soil for wheat
it is mcuh better that the subsoil as
well as the surface be well stirred NOT
by turning it to the surface and made
to overlie the true soil, rich in dccompos-
ing fibre, but so loosened up that when
the surface soil is turned over upon it,
1t will act as conduit to conduct of
any excess of water with which the
surface soil may become charged, either
from spring-heads. rains or SHOWS. This
will require two teams of about the
same force and speed, two experienced
plowineD, and two plows-a turning OF
surface pillow and z subsoiler. The sur
face plow starts ahead, turning furrow
some FIVE or six inches deep. The sub
soil plow follows in the same furrow.
ripping it up some four or FIVE inches
deeper, and making the entire depth of
the blowing some ten or eleven inches,
Under this process a heavier euep and
cleaner field may be obtained than by
any other method, and the roots of the
succeeding crops of clover be enabled
to penetrate the earth much deeper, and
ill the same with vegetable matter and
thus aid in developing new plant~food
suitable fol- the succeeding corn crop.
And right here it is well to remember
that under any system Of rotation the
question as TO what cultivation is bes;
for field depends very much on the
treatment the field has previously re-
celved foT period extending over
several years. In point of fact, the
value OF this mode of preparing the
land for a crop of wheat can only be
estimated by giving due consideration
to the relation it bears to the crons
which have preceded as well as those
which are TO follow it in regular
rotation-going backward to the first
crop in the series, corn, and then
forward to the last, grass.
But whether the land has been sub
solled or not, as seed-time approaches
all the manure obtainable about the
premises should be hauled out and
spread upon the plowed ground and
narrowed in previous to drilling or SOW
ing the seed broadcast, as may be
preferred. Some advocate a cross
blowing in order to bury the manure
beneath the surface but this is object
lonable for two geasons4 First, that it
PAGES the manure too far below the
surface and secondly, by cross plowing
the decomposition of the inverted oat-
stubble is interfered with, if not en-
tirely arrested.
In the absence of efficiency of
barnyard and other home made manure.
or where it is intended to apply CONS
mercial fertilizers alone to the wheat.
an admlxture Of equal parts of super~
phosphate Of lime, German potash salts
and Peruvian guano would probably be
best, either drilled in with the wheat or
sown broadcast with the same and har-
rowed in.-Bdlt. Sun.
ut was simply an informal affair."
Kr0fQ tho a1itor I:sA1