The Daily Missoulian. [volume] (Missoula, Mont.) 1904-1961, 1918-02-24
Enormous Farms to Be Made
Behind French Lines in
Western Europe.
DYNAMITE AS PLOWS
Buried Hand Grenades and
Unexploded Shells May
Cause Trouble.

London, Feb. 23.-The British
war office is making plans for carry
ing out an agricultural offensive on an
enormous scale this spring behind the
British lines in France. With the
cordial cooperation of the French
government. thousands of acres Of
grass will be plowed mp, as well as
some parts Of the Old battleficlds.
British soldiers by the thousands will
be employed on the work, most of
them being assigned to this labor dur
ing their period Of reserve duty.
The food grown in this way will, if
the war lasts long enough, so to help
in feeding the British army. Ameri-
can tractor plows will be largely used
i'll the work of turning over the ground.
The area to be titled includes one Of
the most fiercely contested battle
grounds of the war. Heretofore it has
Teen held that little could be done for
perhaps several generations toward re-
storing these bat{lefields to cultivation.
owing partly TO the soil being ''pois-
oned" by asphyxiating gases and high
explosives and partly to the fact that
unexploded shells and grenades would
make blowing very dangerous. But
practical farmers do not agree with
this theory. An American farmer who
recently visited the whole Somme area
studying the possibilities OF cultivation
there, stntes:
TO those who believe that the land
has ben poisoned by gas and shell
fumes, might point out that while
these fumes wilt fresh foliage, the eff
feet Is only temporary, rarely lasting
for more than a week or two. The soil
itself Is not deletcriously affected.
No Great Danger.
las to the churning up of the earth
by bursting shells. I might point out
that sub-soiI cultivation by the use of
dynamite has been practiced in Amer
len for several years. In all the world
1 know of no soil more likely to bene-
fit by this process than that Of north
ern France, underlaid as it is by strata
Of accompanying chalk.
Evidence Of the fertility Of these
hattlefields is found in the wealth of
flowers ana weeds with which they are
already covered. Never under the
hands OF the husbandman have these
farms brought forth such verdure.
II beiievea that the danger from un-
exploded shells is practically negligible.
A shell which has failed to go off at
the end of five or ten mile flight
through the air Is not likely to be dis
'urbed by n prod from a pillow. More
over. the explosive in a shell or gre
made detefiorates rapidly from burial
in damp earth. Buried barbed wire
must be picked UP. pulled up, or cut
off as 1t Is encountered. Concrete
fragments, heavy iron and the like will
have to be picked up bodily and carted
away.
This leaves one problem to be
solved-a practicable way of effecting
the first rough cultivation
The first implement to be used
should be a harrow of enormous
strength, raking the earth to "a depth
of Is inches to two feet 1t could be
hauled by a 20-foot cable from u
tank tractor. The next process would
be a further smoothing of the ground
10y means of "a string of tractor plows.
After that the ground would be ready
for the ordinary processes of cultiva-
ton. .a---