WHEAT GROWING.

Patea Mail, 7 December 1881, Page 1

WHEAT GROWING.

Professor Custance, the agricultural chemist, in one of his lectures recently delivered in Adelaide, has the following remarks; —“To practice continuous wheat-growing successfully requires a thorough cultivation of the soil. As far as possible all weeds should be destroyed ; in addition to this suitable fertilisers should be applied. The results of fallowing probably are due to the improve!) ment in the mechanical texture of the soil, disintegration of some of the mineral substances required by the wheat plant, the absorption of ammonia from the atmosphere by the soil, and the accession of nitric acid and ammonia from the air in the form of rain, the oxidation of vegetable matter in the soil producing nitric acid. The growth of a green crop and ploughing it in the soil would be in many cases more beneficial than a bare fallow. How can we practice continuous wheat growing more advantageously ? The solution of this question on an experimental farm I look forward to with interest; at the same time I may say it appears to me that a thorough and deep stirring of the soil by the cultivator (instead of ploughing), the extirpation of weeds by horse-hoeing between the growing crop, the application of substances procured from natural deposits, which 1 hope are to be found in some districts of the Colony, such as phosphates, gypsum, nitrate of soda, &c., would enable the farmer to grow much larger crops of wheat than at present. The farmer cannot continue the present mode of wheat cultivation profitably ; therefore something must be done if profitable crops are to be grown. The influence of climate and season is very great, the necessity of a sufficient supply of water during the growing period of a crop is evident, as all the plant food obtained from the soil is taken up through the medium of water, and the amount of water daily lost by the plant through evaporation is very large. Though we are powerless as far as the weather is concerned, we can exert considerable influence on the condition of the soil.”