Year: 1872

At this time very few Southern


farmers attempt to raise cotton with


out the aid of more or less CONNER


cial manures, and experience has


taught them that these concentrated


fertilizers can only be depended on


as supplement to farm yard or


other vegetable manures, as without


humus in the soil no reliance can be


placed on the action of chemical


manures. Hence the present grow


ing interest Of every Southern farm


er IN green forage crops, not only to


feed stock but to plough in to fix hui


mus In the soil so that they can real


ize the full benefit of the commercial


manures they now own and all ap-
! ply yearly to their cotton crops.
/ The Importance of green crops to fix


vegetable matter in the soil is appar-
entvhen we reflect that 8, 900 pounds
of farm-yard manure contains, ac-
cording to the Chemistry of the
Farm, 2,456 pounds of water and
only 1872 pounds of carbonaceous
matter, "a pounds of salts, and 128
pounds of common sand. If the
soil is exhausted of all vegetable I
matter we cannot suppose that this
"a pounds of salts made up of nj /.
trogen, forlmic acid, potash, &c,
with the aid of 332 pounds of vege-
table matter; can be as effective in
amending the soil as it would be if
supplemented by a previous green
crop ploughed in. II, as the South
ern farmers now tell us, that concen-
t4etsa f11-tili1.e1D e.ro of no offooe On
land exhausted of its vegetable mat
ter, how can we expect that 81
pounds of these same fertilizers ac-
companied only by 332 pounds of
vegetable remains, can do any more
for the soil that receives it than the
same amount of commercial manure
does for the humus exhausted land
of the South


A correspondent of the Rural Ala
bamian says: "There is not to-day
in this section of country an intelli-
gent farmer who will deny the suc-
cess of the cultivated grasses; the
doubts of the most skeptical have
been removed, not by process of
reasoning, but by occular demonstra-
tions; but L do not know where
grass or clover has succeeded when
sown with small grain. Sickly and
enfeebled by the overshadowing of
the grain crop, it willis and dies on
the removal of the grain, being un-
able to withstand the, scorching in
huence of the SUM-" He says OF one
clover field seeded fifteen years ago:
Since it was originally seeded it
has produced both grain and cotton
crops; yet the clover crop the past
year was a luxuriant one, although
the field had never been seeded but
the one time. To this success in
growing clover the North can pro-
duce no parallel 1t proves that in
our Southern climate, our fields once
seeded to clover will under judicious
management prove permanent even
under system of ration" One
cotton planter who has used 25 tons
of commercial manures In one year
now says he has abandoned it until
he can grow a clover crop TO fiji veg
etable matter in the soil. To this
end he dresses his clover field with a
compost OF yard manure, muck, cot
ton seed, salt, and plaster, which
will not fail to give him good Glow
er crop. Icould hardly believe the
clover story, if / had not seen itrun
out timothy and then the blue grass,
and it now hold the supremacy after
a stand of more than thirty years,
seeding itself.