INDIANA   FARMER.
Devoted to Agriculture, Horticulture, "Tccliunics and the  Useful Arts.
D. P. Holloway, W. T.Dennis,
R. T. Heed.—Editors.
RICHMOND, DEO'R 1,1854.
(Holloway <fc Co.,  Publishers.
I     Vol. IV *Vo. 3.
On the Improvement of Lund.
How shall wo carry on a system of farming
that shall yield us a fair remuneration for capital
and labor, and at the same time not only prevent
our lands from deteriorating, but gradually im
prove them? Here is a question of the greatest
importance to the farmer, and not only to him,
but to all the world beside. Millions on millions
of acres of what were once the most fertile and
fruitful fields, are now sterile and barren. Look
at Assyria, at Palestine, at portions of Africa and
Europe, and even some of the older settled parts
of our own country. And there can hardly be
any soil sufficiently rich in the elements of vegetable life, but that it may in process of time, by
continual cropping and bad management, be reduced to this condition.
The draught on the resources of the soil in the
great West is enormous. If we reflect for a moment on how many thousands of fine cattle and
sheep are annually driven to the Eastern market,
how many million pounds of our pork are exported to the South and other places, and what
prodigious quantities of our wheat and flour are
consumed in various parts ofthe world, we may
be able to form some little conception of the materials extracted from our fields. Now if it is
certain that the loss to. tho soil occasioned by the
removal of such vast amounts of produce must
be supplied from somewhere, and in some way, or
the land is continually growing poorer. All the
manure that can be manufactured on the farm,
out of the waste materials, excrements of the
stock, &c, will not nearly supply the deficiency.
Lime only brings out the Went principles of the
soil, and guano is out of the question in the
West. In what way, then, is this deficiency to
be supplied?
The experience of the American farmer has
lono- since established the fact that a rotation of
crops, in which several years of grass for meadow and pasture form an indispensable part, is the
only way to prevent a decrease of the productiveness of his lands. For it is well known that land
devoted exclusively to grain growing grows poorer, and would continually become barren. From
these facts, it would seem that grass is a great fertilizer, but we are of opinion that it is not as mead- j
ow but as pasture that its good effects are the
most apparent.   When the grass is annually cut
off and removed, it cannot be of much advantage
to the ground, as when one half is trodden down
by stock, to rot on the surface, and a considerable part of what they consume is returned in the
form of their excrements. Grasses and other
perennials, whether herbs or trees, strike their
roots deep into the soil, finding their sustenance
where animals cannot reach, and leave what they
have thus acquired to decay near the surface, and
become food for other plants.
But it is in a different way that the greatest
amount of nutriment is obtained by grasses, in
common with other plants, and thus transferred to the surface of the ground. Chameleonlike, they possess the faculty of feeding on
the surrounding atmosphere. This fact, however, strange as it may appear, has long since been
fully established, and perhaps never more conclusively than in the experiment which we have
seen at different times, thus described:
"Two hundred pounds of earth were dried in
an oven, and afterwards put into a large earthern
vessel; tho vessel was then moistened with soft
water, and a willow tree, weighing five pounds
was placed therein. During the space of five
years, the earth was carefully watered with rain
water or pure water. The willow grew and
flourished, and to prevent the earth being mixed
with fresh earth, or dust blown into the pot, it
was covered with a metal plate, perforated with
a great number of holes, suitable for free admission of pure air only. After growing in the
earth for five years, the willow tree was removed
and found to weigh one hundred and sixty nine
pounds and three ounces. The leaves which fell
from the tree every autumn were not included in
this weight. The earth was then removed from
the vessel, again dried in the oven, and afterwards
weighed; it was discovered to have lost only
about two ounces of its original weight. Thus
one hundred and sixty-four pounds of lignin or
woody fibre, bark, etc., was certainly produced
from the air."
.It is apparent, then, that ground should never
be allowed to lie naked, but should always be
covered with some kind of vegetation, something
to imbibe and transfer from atmosphere to the
soil the fertilizing elements with which it is rife.
Clover in a particular manner possesses this faculty, and hence there seems to be nothing else
which so speedily improves the quality of land.
Even when two crops are annually taken off, its
beneficial effects on the soil, are soon perceptible.