The Richmond palladium and sun-telegram., 1912-02-03
OUR TREES = THEIR SOIL RELATION

phere and whatever minerals or gas
1t gets from the ground dissolved in
water that is taken in through the
roots.
Ordinary plants, like trees require to
sustain and continue their lives ten
chemical elements: Wis. carbon, hydro
gen, oxygen and nitrogen: sulphur.
phosphorus. potassium. magnesium
and iron. The six last of these are
found in the ashes of wood when it has
been burned and therefore represent
what comes from the soil There min
erals are all dissolved out of the soil
by water and enter the plant in solu-
ton through its roots. The four other
elements, when wood is burned, escape
into the atmosphere from whence they
came and represent by far the greater
part OF the solid material in plant.
In a previous article, the importance
of water in the lives of plants was
pointed out. In this connection, may be
added another characteristic. Water is
the only liquid that comes any way
near being a universal solvent. There
are very few metals or minerals that
water will not dissolve. When, there
fore, the rain falls and sinks into the
ground it dissolves these six minerals
out of the soil, and coming in contact
with the absorbing roots of trees they
are taken in with the water 1t must
be therefore, apparent that II trees are
in water should not be reduced. for
they are thus deprived not only of wa
ter but of these necessary plant foods.
Now while water is absolutely neces-
sary to dissolve these minerals out of
the soil so that they may be availa-
BILE for the tree, yet very few trees or
land plants of any kind can take in
through their roots water in liquid
form or in the way We think of water
lows growing along a river, develop
water roots, and send them out of the
soil into the water of the stream. Most
people in STOPPING down for a drink at
the Chautauqua spring have noticed
long slender reddish fibres floating
abundantly in the clear water. These
are the water roots of the. willows that
are standing near by. The willow has
these in addition to it's soil roots
Plants that grow either submerged in
the water. or partly SO, absorb water
through their entire surface, and their
roots, II they have any. act only as an.
chors; but trees like the oak, that are
strictly land plants get their water
supply through their soil roots, and
these roots cannot use water in the
form as it exists in a river or spring
That they do not use water in this
form must be manifest when we re-
member that in the summer, days and
weeks sometimes elapse in which
there is no rain and yet the trees in
the forest and along the streets, and
the field crops are obtaining a steady
supply of water from the soil in which
they stand, while it is evident that the
water from the last rain has sank into
the ground far below the level of the
longest root, or at least has reached
the level of the shallowest we'll in the
neighborhood.
When it has been shown by expert
ment that maple tree thirty-Ave feet
in height, well developed, and with at
many foliage leaves as such a tree
should have, takes from the sol
through it's roots and casts off into the
air through its leaves more than bar
rel of water daily in the summer, il
would not be surprising If We wonder
where it gets that amount when il
hasn't rained for a month or more.
This will be the subject of anothe,
article in which the structure Of soils
| will be considered.