INCREASED FERTILITY

Wairarapa Times-Age, 21 April 1938, Page 3

INCREASED FERTILITY

USE OF SUPERPHOSPHATE. Investigations have indicated that the application of 3 cwt of superphosphate once in three years increases the carrying capacity of 11 wet sheep per acre country by one sheep per acre with a satisfactory | net return. Although this assumption is justified in some instances, it is not so in all. However, there art- large ureas

where the improvement from topdressing will be greater than that specified, while at the same time realising that there are also large areas where the improvement, if any, will be so slight or so slow as to make improvemen t by top-dressing a doubtful econom c proposition. One thing is very obvious, and that is the need for investigation into extent to which deterioration can be arrested and carrying capacity increased by systematic top-dressing.

on all our major types of hill country. The form which such investigation should take is largely a mattei of opinion, and may vary with conditions. Trials of fertilisers should be combined with the sowing of subterranean and white clover on soils and under conditions suited to them, because it as abundantly evident that the improvement of soil fertility is very closely connected with and dependent on the encouragement of leguminous plants.