LUCERNE AS A SOIL IMPROVER.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XLI, Issue 2051, 6 November 1919, Page 3

LUCERNE AS A SOIL IMPROVER.

It must be taken into consideration that, apart from crop-returns, the laud on which lucerne is grown is not depreciating in quality, but greatly increasing in productiveness. This is due to the power of the lucerne plant as a collector of nitrogenous matter from the air, and of drawing to the top' soil, from strata at great depths underneath, valuable mineral elements that shal-low-rooted plants could never reach, leaving these elements of fertility to be utilized by future crops of whatever kind. Further, the mechanical effect of the extensive root-system of the lucerne plant can hardly be overestimated. The decaying of the roots adds humus to the soil, and the openings left by them in the under-strata form a wonderful system of channels for the penetration of air and water into the soil. The continual, dropping of lucerne leaves from the cuttings also makes heavy animal contributions to the humus and nitrogen of the soil. Thus when the lucerne field is ready to be used for a different crop it will he found that the soil is wonderfully changed not only in its clicmical elements, but also in its physical character. In countries where this aspect of lucerne culture has been invetsigated it is estimated tliat, after a field has been in lucerne for five or six years the fertilising value of the stubble and some Gin. deep of roots ploughed under is about £4 per acre, wide the value of the stubble and entire root-system is not less than £7 per acre. —N.Z. Journal of Agriculture.