Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1929-07-23
THIS AND THAT
BY CHARLES L. TRACEWELL.

, efforts at watering and fighting the red
spider.
other crops gave only half success.
Gradually 1t began to dawn on the
gardener that the fertility had gone
out of his soil.
The question then was how to get it
back into the land again. The study OF
soils and their conditions Is one de-
from such knowing there is the simpler
one which recognizes when crops are or
are not growing well.
It is true that there are other factors
besides fertility and lack of fertility
which spell success or failure in home
garden making A reluctance to get
out the hose when dry spells make 1t
necessary Is one of the most common.
The average home garden Is perhaps
too we'll drained If anything, owing to
the determination Of most builders TO
draw the water away from the founda-
tions. This gives the resident a nice
dry basement, and nice dry garden as
well.
Lack Of the proper elements for plant
growth, however is the main reason, we
are convinced, for unsatisfactory gar
dens, especially after the first few years
of garden making in the same place.
ICES the chemical elements supplied in
fertilizer or merely makes use OF them
to gather its food from the air and
sun makes no difference at all to the
home gardener.
His common sense, II not his reading.
makes him realize that there can be but
one real reason for the half-starved ap-
pearance of his garden: His plants &C.
tually need feeding.
TYIc hnu IN them
then, becomes the paramount question
confronting the home gardener. So he
begins a perfectly amateurish investiga-
ton of the subject. He tries, one after
the other, all the we'll advertised fer
tilizers. He tries those with sand as
base and those with lime as base.
He soon realizes that, no matter how
effective they may be, he has not had
enough experience to use them salts
factorily. One has to have sure
knowledge of plant health and disease
to make the best use Of what may be
termed trick fertilizers. The sad part
about popping up" sick plant is that
the worse it looks the less concentrate
feeding 1t can stand.
Bone meal Is very good. but 1t lacks
necessary elements. Certain new dis
coveries in fertilizers call for chemical
elements which tend to make the soil
acid In reaction.
The home gardener thus becomes
thrown back on natural manures for
the proper feeding of his garden. He
sees the great piles throughout the
State of Pennsylvania and reasons that
II these growers. whose very living de-
ponds upon proper plant growth. find
its use expedient, he might find 1t a
good thing himself.
It is too late to use barnyard manure
this Summer. but in the Fall. when the
old plants are dug up and the ground
must be got ready for next Spring, the
time arrives for renewing the fertility
of wornout soils.
There can be little question that the
average home gardener Is too niggardly
In his use of all types Of fertilizers
He has read of the dangers of burning
his plants and he feels that he would
rather err on the side of safety.
No doubt he is right-during his
first few years as gardener. After
that he finds that conservatism does
not pay. in a garden sense. Let him
put on well rotted COW manure with a
generous hand, keeping in mind the
pictures he saw along the Pennsylvania
roads.