The Springfield herald. (Springfield, Baca County, Colo.) 1887-1919, 1915-03-05
A Weekly Talk
On Dry Farming,

how.
1.-THE above text taken from the Denver West.
Farm Life, we shall keep at the hs sai Of these
talks for the volume Of fact that is boiled down
| in the few words there is in i'll.
! The matter of knowing how"
begins with the planting. and
the matter OF planting begins
with the preparation of the
seed bed.
Probably before the subject
can be properly treated the
question of top planting and list,
er planting should be first con-
sidered, is the new man comes al
most invariably with the preju-
dices of his eastern educat on,
and very often refuses to part
from them until his path has been
illuminated by the light Of an
actual dry-land experience.
! The editor came here with this
prejudice; but after some years
Of careful study and observation
we came to believe that to plow
and top plant in a dry climate is
both unsound in theory and uh-
safe in practice.
We shall first notice the two
things against listing that first
occurred to us-that there is
more surface exposed, and that
the roots OF the plants had to
penetrate the hard ground.
Both of these propositions are
true, but they are not to the dis
advantage of the plant, as the
logic in the case would seem to
indicate.
AS TO the greater surface ex-
posed, we find this: That it takes
but a comparatively short time
for the moisture to leave ground
that is freshly turned over,
whether turned by a plow or u
lister; and about the same length
of time in the one case as in the
other,
We find also that the moist
ure remains very close to the
surface OF the hard ground un-
der the turn'.d-over soil for a
great length of time after The
turned over soil has lost the
moisture that was in it when
turned over.
1t follows consequently that
the au.ount of soil that dries out
or loses it's moisture in Ger
tain length of time is about in
proportion 10 the soil turned
over, which is usually less in the
case of listed ground:
1t follows as sequence that
the seed wants to be planted
close to, on, or into the hard
ground under the turned-over
soil, to always be assured a suf-
tcient moisture for termination
and root development
In plowed ground, consequent
| ly, rurrow openers should be used
to get the seed down to this
moisture-hslding bed, as being
| the next best thing; bat even
this method we believe tn have
double disadvantage over list
ing
The first disadvantage is that
weed seeds are thus in the fur
row, and germinate and come up
with the grain. The second is
that the roots find moisture on
Iy by y downward renetration,
while in the listed furrow it
finds moisture both Gownwardly
ard laterally, as there is mois-
tule holding soil in both Girec-
tions.
Onr first thought, in conect-
tion with the wo methods, that
this hard ground would be inim-
icahle to root development. we
find to have been erroneous. On
the contrary. n mpaftVely
compact soil is tte only one
in which root development can
b." perfected, as only in "a COM
pact soil can the rootlets absorb
moisture and food to the best ad-
vantage.
other advantages of listing ov
er top planting will come out
when the matter of cultivation
is reached.
The necessity of cultivation