Manchester Democrat. [volume] (Manchester, Iowa) 1875-1930, 1907-04-17
Why We Plow and Cultivate

Farming is a very ancient bust
ness. and the plow in some form,
whether it be the forked stick or the
triple gang plow, is the Oldest of all
agricultural implements; but the
question of why we plow has never
received the consideration that it
should have.
Until about two hundred years
ago the farmers idea of plowing
was to get enough loose soil to cover
his crop. and thus allow it to ger
inmate. Farmers in that day, and,
in fact, up to the time of Jethro
Tull, about one hundred and fifty
years ago. did not seem to have any
definite idea as to how plants grow.
That worthy, whose name should be
forever held in grateful remem-
brance among good farmers, had
the idea that plants took up minute
particles of the soil itself. He pub
lished volume after volume on this
subject, and while his practice was
invariable right and in fact quite
modern, his theories were all wrong,
just as in these modern times the,
theories of many scientific farmers
are all right and their practice all
wrong; for it is matter of history
that theory and practice do not al
ways work together, desirable as it
is that they should. @sg5A{y
When farmers get hold Of the
idea that plants take their food al
ways liquid and in solution, and do
not live on the soil itself except in
this way, it became quite clear that
water is one of the essential ele-
ments of plant growth, and, there
fore, that plowing should be done
for the purpose Of putting the soil
in such condition that it should
have the greatest water-holding
capacity, not the capacity of holding
the greatest amount of water betwee n
the particles, but of holding large
amount of water in films around the
surface of the soil grains. They
soon discovered that the finer the
tilth and the greater the number of
soil grains, the more surface there
was, and, therefore, the greater the
water-holding capacity.
Studying the matter thoroughly,
they found that there is seldom
during the summer season suffi-
cient rainfall to supply the wants of
the crop, and hence that it was
necessary not merely to plow deep
and reduce the soil to fine tilth,
but to have the turned furrow in
close capillary connection with the
subsoil below, in order that the
plants might draw up water from
below when there was a deficiency
of it coming from the clouds. This
further modified the theories of cul-
tivation.
Then another step was made.
Farmers began to realize that while
tillage was not manure, it was the
next thing to it. While it did not
add any fertility to the soil, it rem.
dered more available the fertility
already in the soil, which cannot be
wholly exhausted by anything tina,
man can do or fail to do. In other
words, that the soil is great
chemical laboratory in which th'
food of plants is prepared, and pre-
pared largely in proportion to thu
amount of intelligent tillage that is
put upon it.
1t is only in recent years that thi
idea has taken hold in the mind O
the farmer, and even now only il
the minds of the most intelligen
farmers. 8. Such farmers are begin
ming to realize that the water hole
ing capacity and, so to speak, th
efficiency of the workings of til
, chemical laboratory are greatly ir
creased by the addition of vegetabl
matter; in other words, that til
mineral elements of the soil cannt
be brought into such shape as
furnish food for plants except i
connection with decaying vegetab
matter.
The subject of why we plow an
: why we cultivate is a very lars
( one, ever new and interesting, opel
ing up wider vistas of thought tha
Q men who simply plow because the
: fathers plowed are able to scan
y once. -Wallaces' Farmer.