Evening Republican, Volume 21, Number 221, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 3 October 1917 — BIG IMPORTANCE OF LEGUME INOCULATION [ARTICLE]

BIG IMPORTANCE OF LEGUME INOCULATION

Soil Fertility Increased by Plowing Under Leguminous Crop, Says an Expert. For centuries legumes have been used in crop rotation because they enrich the soli. Why alfalfa, the clovers and other similar crops make the soil richer w’as discovered about 30 years ago, when It was shown that legumes can use the nitrogen Of the atmosphere w’hile other plants must take - It from the soil. By plowing under a leguminous crop, soil fertility may be increased by that nitrogen taken from the air. The leguminous plant, however, can get Its nitrogen from the air only through bacteria, living on its roots. Certain bacteria In the soil enter the small, roots and cause them to swell Into wartlike growths of nodules. Inside of these nodules millions of the legume bacteria grow and these are agents that take the nitrogen from the air and give it to the plants. Without bacteria the legume plant will not use nitrogen from the air, but from the soil the same as any other crop. To use atmospheric nitrogen as fertilizer one must make certain that the proper bacteria are present in the soil. This can be done by inoculating, which consists in applying the bacteria to the seed or scattering them on the field. The bacteria can be had in soil where a legume grew recently and produced nodules, or in pure cultures grown In special laboratories. The use of the soil is as effective as the pure culture, according to W. A. Albrecht of the University of Missouri College of Agriculture, but often a properly Inoculated soil cannot be had.