. Productive soils; the fundamentals of successful soil management and profitable crop production. Soils. SOME SOILS ARE DROUGHTY 99 Moisture Supply Better in Silt Loams Than in Sand.—Sandy soils give up their water much more easily and completely than silt loams and clays, nevertheless the latter soils generally furnish to crops a much better moisture supply. The figures in the last column of the table seem to indicate that crops would suffer less for want of water on a coarse sand than on a light colored silt loam during a drought. On the con-/^, trary, crops suffer much more on the sand, fo
. Productive soils; the fundamentals of successful soil management and profitable crop production. Soils. SOME SOILS ARE DROUGHTY 99 Moisture Supply Better in Silt Loams Than in Sand.—Sandy soils give up their water much more easily and completely than silt loams and clays, nevertheless the latter soils generally furnish to crops a much better moisture supply. The figures in the last column of the table seem to indicate that crops would suffer less for want of water on a coarse sand than on a light colored silt loam during a drought. On the con-/^, trary, crops suffer much more on the sand, for two main reasons:. Fig. 42.—A droughty soil. A fine loam about 14 inches deep underlaid by coarse sand and gravel. (1) Sand gives up its water more easily than silt loam and hence plants are more lavish with it. (2) In the coarse sand, roots cannot secure moisture by capil- larity from depths below the root zone. Thus it is that corn on sand grows faster than on a silt loam and shows no injury because of lack of rain during the beginning of a dry period, but suffers much for want of water later on as the dry weather continues. Some Soils are Droughty.—Soils which are unable to furnish crops with sufficient moisture during short dry periods are called "droughty''—a deep coarse sand is a good example (Fig. 42). Often the best appearing loam or silt loam proves droughty, because it is underlaid at a shallow depth by a coarse and porous subsoil,. Please note that these images are extracted from scanned page images that may have been digitally enhanced for readability - coloration and appearance of these illustrations may not perfectly resemble the original Weir, Wilbert Walter, 1882-. Philadelphia London, J. B. Lippincott company
Size: 2084px × 1198px
Photo credit: © Central Historic Books / Alamy / Afripics
License: Licensed
Model Released: No
Keywords: ., bookcentury1900, bookdecade1920, booksubjectsoils, bookyear1920
