Note 76 — Chapter VIII · ABSORPTION BY SOILS.

See, The toxic action of acids and salts on seedlings, by F. K. Cameron and J. F. Breazeale, Jour. Phys. Chem., 8, 1-13, (1904). It is quite conceivable, for instance, that if the drainage conditions were not exceptionally good under a heavy type of soil, it might be rendered temporarily unfit for clover or alfalfa by a heavy application of potassium salts or of sodium nitrate. The idea put forward by some authorities that too long continued or over fertilizing renders soils acid, may have better foundation than their theoretical reasoning would seem to warrant.