Carolina watchman. [volume] (Salisbury, N.C.) 1871-1937, 1911-10-25
GREEN MANUaIAs. NO. Il.
Method Of Produ Ing, Using and Compare.
tive Value Of Cow Peas.

Who has not heard of the Gov
pea as hay making and sol,
improving plant? And, who hat
not been led to believe that one
third or more of the nitrogen and
other plant food elements found
in this plant at maturity, are left
in the roots and stubble after the
crop is harvested and cured for
hay, that is to say. out of every
hundred pounds of nitrogen, ETC.,
found in the pea crop at maturity,
334 lbs. are the roots aud stubble?
This was our best information
up to a short time ago and even
now some Of our best agricultural
advisers insist on Ireverbial third
of the nitrogen &C., being LETT in
the underground portion of the
plant. Like the old idea of sour-
ing of the soil on we'll drained
land, some man seems to have
guessed at the amount of nitro.
gen &c., left in the roots and
stubble and hastened to rush his
intenti II into print.
Now a ton Of cured COW peas
has, in the whole plant, about 40
lbs of nitrogen. If one-third of
this amount were in the roots and
stubble we would have loft on the
soil and in the soil about ID It's.
of available nitrogen per acre in
case the acre produced q ton of
COW pea hay. This amount of
nitrogen is equal to that furnish
ed by 70 lbs. of an 8-2-2 fertili-
Ser. a pretty heavy :application
for most farm crops. This
seemed to be rather wsighty ar.
gument IN favor Of cutting the
vines. feeding them to live stock
and putting the manure back on
the land regardless of the fact
that the manure from a ten of
COW pea hay fed to cattle will
cover, we'll, what part of an acre
will it cover?
Our farmers have been acting
on this advice for q number Of
years in faoe of the daily decrsas-
ing fertility of their lands under
this system. W. A. March, of
Union county, took this advice
literally, sowed oats. cut and re-
moved them, and then sowed
cowpeas on the oat stubble and
cut these for hay when mature.
This practice was continued till
his land would not produce a crop
even of peas. Examples could be
multiplied where the pea crop has
been removed year after year with
diss .trous results. Indeed, it
now GEMS that the surest method
of depicting the fertility of ths
soil is to remove 9 crop Of cow
pea vines from it every year for a
few years in succession.
The real explanation of this
phenomenon has finally been
discovered. In an exhaustive go.
rles of tests and experiments con-
Quoted by a number of our best
experiment static ns it has teen
found that the amount of nitro
gan, &C., left in the roots and
stubble of the covpea plant is
not one-third but about one.
tenth of that found in the whole
plant. Here seems to be one of
the leading factors in the expla-
nation of the running down Of
average Soils by the annual re
moval of the pea crop. Another.
and. perhaps the leading facto I
is that all the organic matter il
removed from the soil for series
cf years by this method and thus
all bacterial life is driven from
the land which is thereby rem
dered dead. These dead soils are
not necessarily robbed of theil
mineral plant foods, however, as
will be demonstrated by plowine
down q COW pea crop or a good
crop of rye for q year or two il
succession.
One ton of green cow pea
vines contains about 5.5 lbs. q
nitrogen; 2 lbs. of phosphate anc
6 lbs. of potash. It is an easy
matter, on average soil, to get &
growth of IL tons of some enc ol
the rank growing varieties pei
acre, which will cure up int
three tons of hay.
COMPOSITION OF GREEN COW PEI
VINES COMPARED WITH COMPo.
eITION CT FRESH COW. AND
HORSE MANURE.
Nitro Phos. Pot