Evening star., 1932-10-06
Amateur gardens never "stay put"
in the ordinary sense Of that good vul-

Amateur gardens never "stay put. "
In the ordinary sense Of that good vul-
garism.
They are forever experimenting with
new plants, new materials to help their
plants grow, new tools to make garden
work easier and better.
Among the materials which have
come into large vogue in American
home gardens during the past decade
are peat moss and humus.
Their respective merits are subject
for debate among gardeners everywhere
They receive attention largely be-
cause they supply material which is
increasingly difficult to secure under
modern living conditions.
Not every one Is SO situated that he
is able to have access to quantities OF
good, rich loam," or to stable manure
or to woods dirt. or to any Of the
other sorts of substances containing
natural humus.
Hence the gardener turns with In
creasing frequency to the so-called peat
moss. as generally phraSed, and to
humus per Sc.
A great many more amateurs are
familiar with peat perhaps than with
humus as such. Both may be pur-
chased at fairly reasonable rates.
They are quite different in appear
ance, however, and no doubt give diff
ferent results, but so little scientific in
vestigation has been done on them
and what little has been done Is scarcely
available-that the amateur grower OF
plants will be forced to depend upon
his own Investigations.
Fortunately, this state OF affairs i
one extremely to the liking Of the aver
age home gardener He feels that he
is an ''experimenter." that not all the
fun Of experimentation Is to be left tC
the chemist
Here is a rich field for the nature
lover. the man or woman interested in
the growing things of the garden who
wants to grow them as well as possible.
Especially does the city gardener oil
the suburban gardener find such expert
mentation essential. He never forgets
that the bit of land he turns into his
flower garden or into his vegetable
patch has been part of mankind's daily
living for many years. Even II he lives
in the suburbs, he knows that the yaro
in which his house stands was once
part of a farm. Maybe 1t wasn't such
good farm, either. as farms go.
The soil. in any event, is likely to bt
no great shakes for fertility. Maybe il
is thick clay, SO prevalent in and neal
Washington. Or it may be crumbly
almost sandy, soil. sometimes callec
| rotten stone"
The chances are that it needs en-.
| riching, not so much by chemical ele.
ments perhaps as by tightening OF tht
| soil. a mechanical separation of it,
| particles, SO that it more nearly resem.
bles the typical good, rich soil o.
every gardeners dream.
Humus and peat will do great dea
| toward ameliorating any soil Sant
will help, but, necessarily does no
! furnish certain essential factors to b
found in both humus and peat moss.
Peat moss, as the term is general,
used is in reality bog peat, formed
| from moses OF the genus Sphagnum
1t may be well here to give the die
tionary definitions of peat" anc
''humus."
Peat is "a carbonaceous Substanc,
formed by partial decomposition il
water of various plants
Humus is "a brown or black mate
rial formed by the partial decomposi
ton of vegetable or animal matter.
Humus is, indeed, the organic portion
Of SOIL
Now all is just about as clear a
mud!
We sincerely hope that no chemis
wants to dispute this. As far as W,
can discover. no one knows much inor'
about humus today than the Roman
did when they named 1t so, "humus,
meaning soil
Humus is soil, and that Is about al
the scientific gentlemen know about it
Humus gives top soil, so-called, it
color
The stuff called "humus," and pur
chased as SUCH greatly resembles coffe,
grounds. especially in color
1t is very dark. practically black
especially when strewn on ordinar
earth