Wessington Springs herald. (Wessington Springs, Aurora County, Dakota [S.D.]) 1883-1891, 1884-02-29
The Value Of Green Manures.

Farmers have an exceedingly made
Nuate idea of the value of green ma
nures. One who will SOW his seed and
vat patiently for the crop will be too
impatient to grow a crop of rye o corn
or clover to be plowed under to enrich
the soil and return it's rich harvest an
other year. Another will spend hun
drcds Of dollars for purchased manur
OR fertilizers, but will not spend tens in
growing a crop to pillow into the soil for
the same purpose. And there are farm
ers who have determined to pillow under
q clover sod and have top-dressed in the
fall or winter with this intention, but
who have lost heart when they have
seen a luxuriant growth on the ground,
which seemed to be "a waste of good
fodder" as they have said, and so they
have waited and have either pastured it
OF moved it off and robbed the soil of
food which it so:ely needed. This
would seem quite different if farmers
would think of their soil as something
to be fed and supported to enable it to
yield its produce, as much as a COW
that yields milk or a sheep that yields
wool. There are some close analories
between u fields and our animals. An
1 10 " wv 14hC W Cu1l
It so-by which we make salable prod
haustible for it's term of life so long as
it is fed; but it is really inexhaustible in
fact, because, before its useful life ends,
simply becomes a link in a chain which
we may draw out indefinitely without
reaching the end of it. So that in this
rinn, of - ~-o, -, ~,- =, 49,
bic so long as it is fed. And SO is the
soil, and no and no longer, and,
indeed, if it is not fed, a field will be
mere dead, useless matter, just as a
starved COW o. sheep will be. The
farmer must learn to think Of his land
IN this way or he gets a wrong idea of
it. He must not neglect to study up
the science of feeding his fields as he
reads up that of feeding his live stock.
He must become acquainted with feed
ing tables and rations and kinds of food
for the land as we'll as for animals, and
must provide them literally. And as
clover is accounted an excellent food
for stock so it is an excellent food for
land. But, at the same time, as there
are other folders which can be used
along with clover, or Us a substitute
When nelped II Dy more stimulating
food, SO there are other crops beside
clover which may be. made to serve as
food for the soil. Indeed, the soil is
not very eXacting in this respect, al
though it will neve give something for
nothing, and always returns freely in
exact proportion to what it receives and
no more; but it is omnivcrous and has
an exceedingly strong digestion. So
that the farmer can not go astray if he
will always provide something for it.
t may be weeds and no more, but it is
letter if it is a crop of buckwheat, and
oetter still if it is rye or corn or even
urnips or rape, but best of all if we can
give it rich clover which goes down
1eeply and draws food from the subsoil
and opens it broad leaves to the air and
~athers from that source too, as well as
'thers which other plants can not reach,
Ind SO gives to the farmer a hundred
Old in return for the seed and labor he
as expended. There are other Ways
y manuring the soil, but among them
flowing in of green crops has no supe-
ior.-M Y. Times,