Wichita eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1886-1890, 1889-04-18
Prevention Of DrOuth.

Prof. &. 4. Blake oilers remedy 1ol
drouth and hot winds that has gooc
reason and sound logic for premise. Ii
the course of quite lengthy article OIL
the subject which is published in the
Kansas Farmer, he says:
| think the farmers in Kansas and
| other western states do not appreciate
the importance of the remedy suggest
nor its simplicity. My remedy fol
drouth and hot winds is not deep plow-
ing, which is very expensive, but sub
soil blowing, which is not expensive.
Most farmers of experience know that
very deep blowing takes much greater
amount of horse power than they can
afford; also that when the subsoil is
turned on top by deep blowing the
land is nearly worthless for two
years or until the subsoil SC
turned up can be rendered fit for vegeta-
ton by frost, air and sunshine, which
generally takes two years. Hence deep
blowing is impracticable. But subsoil
blowing is a very different thing. The
proper subsoil plow is made like the sub
soiler on the bottom of the lister, only it
should be a little larger. 1t can be run
eight or ten inches deep with one horse
and should be run in the bottom of the
furrow behind the sulky pillow. The
sulky pillow need not turn the surface soil
more than three or four inches deep,
which can be done with a light team.
Then the subsoiler with one good horse
should follow. Most agricultural imple-
ment dealers have subsoil plows for sale
or can easily procure them. Any good
blacksmith can make one. When the
land is thus subsoiled it will last for years,
so that for the next several years shallow
surface blowing only is needed.
The object to be obtained is to loosen
the hard subsoil so that the roots of corn
and other crops can penetrate it, and to
make a reservoir to hold all the water
that falls in heavy rains. 1t is probable
that on the average fully twelve inches
of water each year run off of Kansas soil
into the Gulf of Mexico, where not need
ed, thus depriving the subsoil of what it
needs to store away against time OF
drouth. If twelve inches of water over
the entire state of Kansas were collected
in one body it would make lake sixty
miles long, fifty miles wide and thirty
feet deep. This would contain more
water than all that could be collected in
a year in artificial ponds in the valleys at
the eastern base of the Rocky mountains
from Mexico to Canada. Nearly all of
this surplus water which now goes to the
gulf, causing unnecessarily high water
at times in the Missouri and Mississippi
rivers, can be saved to Kansas, "where
it will do the most good, by having the
entire state subsoil plowed once in SIX or
eight years.
1t is we'll known that the soil covered
with bnffalo grass in western Kansas
sheds water like a ducks back. 1t is
also true, not only in western
Kansas but in most of the west
ern states, that the soil is so hard
below the first three inches where it
has been plowed that water can pene-
trate it but slowly, and that as soon as
the three inches of loose top soil is filled
with water during hard rain all the
rest flows off into the creeks. This is
wrong and must be stopped before Kan
Sas and other states on the eastern slope
will be free from ''hot winds" and most
IL free from drouth. If the soil is
loosened with the subSoiler to depth of
twelve inches it will absorb water like a
sponge, and will hold all that ordinarily
falls during our hardest rains 1t will
then take its time to sink deeper, so that
If another heavy rain occurs in day or
two the twelve inches of loose top soil
will be ready TO absorb it and again store
it below, whence it will be drawn by
capillary attraction 10 feed the roots of
vegetation in time of drouth. This. to-
gether with the fact that the corn roots
will go much deeper in loose subsoil
than in hardpan. Will enable the crop TO
pass successfully through drouth
which would prove fatal in case of
shallow planting
Then, too, in many years rains do not
penetrate below this hardpan three or
four inches below the surface, even if
there have been heavy but sudden rains
The consequence is that corn roots do
not try 60 penetrate TO a dry soil beneath
Vegetation roots have enough intelli-
gence on their plane TO 80 where drink
can be found, the same as an old topper
has. If there is moisture below the
roots will struggle fer it and go still deep
er as the surface becomes more and more
dry. Then, too, bad stand of corn is
frequently had on account of too much
water IN the surface soil Immediately
after planting Had it been su5soii
plowed to depth of twelve inches this
surface water would sink below, leaving