Perth Amboy evening news., 1922-06-27
Geographic News
Bulletins By the
National Geographic Society
AGRICULTURE DICTATIoN

I'VE recognize that the great
emigrating peoples have gone about
the world picking out regions that
appealed to them. and passing other
large and apparently valuable areas
by: but we have failed to see that
the plants that we depend on have
exercised much the same 'judg-
ment'," says a bulletin from tho
Washington, d. c., headquarters of
the National Geographic Society.
The Dakotas play an important
part in feeding us. we are likely to
assume. because wheat Is wheat, We
like bread made of it. and there Is
plenty OF land in the northern
prairie states on which to grow IT,"
continues the bulletin. so. apples
and peaches are two of our mos.
widely used fruits because their
fiavors strike the popular fancy.
Chemistry of PARKWAY Soil Is Key
But there is much more behind
the reasons why our agriculture is
built on certain definite plants that
are grown best in certain definite
regions of the country. II, in the
long chain of cause and effect that
stretches back from the common
products OF our farms today. to dim
prehistoric times, man had inter-
fered with one link rather than an
other. or forged the early links of
somewhat different stuff, the output
of our fields and orchards might be
as strange to us as are most of the
fruits of tropical Brazil.
THE fact that the soil of Asia
Minor was largely alkaline rather
than acid really started us on the
way toward an agriculture that en-
phasizes wheat as the staff of life,
apples and their kith and kin as the
typical fruits, and roses as the typi-
cal ornamental flowers. The second
and equally important factor is that
civilization began on this alkaline
soil and passed next to the Medi-
terranean countries with q similar
soil. The particular set of grains,
vegetables, fruits and flowers of
Asia Minor were taken over and
developed and finally passed on to
western Europe and America.
Chance for New Kind Reclamation
But there is another division OF
plants-the acid-loving group
which can be considered the Ish-
maelites of the vegetable kingdom.
They have been largely passed by
while their more fortunate relatives
have been bred to greater and
greater perfection by generation af-
tCi 6ShOi dtiOh VI AlSH anu SdiIlcu
to the best alkaline and neutral soils
all over the world. One shining ex-
ception-an acid-soil plant that has
pushed above its fellows and has
won recognition in spite of its menu
bership in an outcast races the |
potato. which came into the contest
from America long after European
agriculture had been founded on its
alkaline base.
"In America the acid soils are
naturally considered u poorest
since they will not properly support
our alkaline-soil vegetation. These
acid soils r given over largely to
wild scrub fruits and herbs. It is
considered by some botanists en-
tirely feasible to correct the one
sided selection Of our remote an
cestors by breeding fruits and plants
of economic value from these neg
lected species. a fact which opens
up the possibility of an entirely new
sort of reclamation that would make
valuable large areas of pine bar
rens, bogs and other regions now
waste land"