Ploughman's Folly Ploughman's Folly - EcoPort

een a matter for conjecture, though part of the explanation at least was advanced earlier in this chapter. A
commonly held theory is that the organic matter hinders the progress of the water over the surface of the minerals
in the soil, thus allowing more time for the minerals to soak it in. Doubtless there is some such effect. It may be
more important than I think. It certainly is true that much of the water soaks directly into the leaves and other plant
residues which are found on the ground. And we know that the entry of moisture into leaf tissue is much easier
than into mineral soil.
It may not be generally known that when water penetrates mineral masses it does so by finding its way between
the particles. The tiny particles of clay, silt, or sand are almost completely exclusive. Water cannot enter them. It
can only cling to their outer surfaces. This is extremely important information to keep in mind in a study of soils, for
organic matter, by contrast, literally pulls liquids into itself. Volume for volume, then, organic matter can hold many
times as much water as can any kind of soil mineral; for organic matter is chiefly open space internally, while
minerals are dense, solid crystal; a fateful distinction where water relations are concerned.
The idea is abroad that man is the lord of creation -- that he dominates the earth. In certain minor respects this
may be true, but in the main it is the purest propaganda; as ineffectual, when we examine the facts, as whistling in
the dark. Consider the single example of erosion. The alarm of thinking men today, when they consider the plight
of coming generations starving on eroded soil, borders on panic. What would they think if there were immediate
prospects of a renewal of the worldwide erosion which originally sculptured the present features of the earth's
surface? That was erosion with a vengeance -- millions on millions of years of it. Mountains were buried in the sea
by the tearing down of the original fire-formed stone of which they were composed, and the removal of the debris
by the unhindered waters and winds which shuttled back and forth across such continents as then existed.
Geologists still puzzle over the wreckage, trying to piece out the story.
That original large-scale erosion was finally curbed. But it was not done by that self-advertising animal called man.
It was done by vegetation -- plants. Plants, the conquerors, had to start from nothing but powdered rock. Some
structural materials they extracted from the minerals themselves, some from the air and the rays of the sun, and
the rest from water. The porous architecture they were able to create from these materials is still the wonder of
existence, though so commonplace as not often to be even an object of curiosity. A casual glance at a bit of onion
skin, or a few strands of algae, under a microscope is a revelation to the uninitiated, even though no further
thought is given to it. If it is considered that this delicate, lacy network of cells could not be possible except for the
presence in infinitesimal amounts of such chemicals as phosphorus, iron, sulphur, calcium, potassium, and
magnesium, the miracle of life becomes apparent. To know, then, that world-wide erosion was curbed in the
beginning by stuff similar to that on the microscope slide should give us a healthy respect for all plants and for their
disintegrating remains; for, down to the last black colloidal remnant of the dead plant or animal tissue, organic
nature continues to fight erosion by the trick of absorption. By eternally coaxing water to enter, organic tissues
keep it under control. Hence the importance of having the organic tissues where the water can reach them the
instant it hits the earth as rain.
Plants are the real masters of the earth. Independent of human management, since they antedated the race,
plants came spontaneously from the sea and threw a restraining influence over the unstable surface of the land,
quieting its restlessness. Botanists explain the process in detail and with plausible reasoning, allowing eons for the
lapse of time from the first single cells to the giant sequoias, and other eons for suitably equipped plants to
complete the vegetative mantle over the earth. Moses offers a different story, of course, but be that as it may, we
can be sure that man will master the rest of creation only as he comes to terms with plants, the real masters. They
hold the key to his food supply.
Admittedly, we have serious erosion to contend with now. Much of our land is again in almost precisely the
condition all land was in before plants arrived. It is bare, and it is in movement. Yet the present situation is
immeasurably more favourable than the earlier one. The same destructive forces of wind and water are at work
now as then, but the forces of plant opposition are now fully organized and mobilized. Alone, unless interfered with
by man, plants can reclaim wayward land in an infinitesimal fraction of the time that was required eons ago, before
they had adapted themselves to such work. Even so, such a reclamation period, when measured in terms of
human lifetimes, may be excessively long. We are likely to get hungry waiting for natural forces alone to stop
erosion and restore soil to the eroding mineral surface. Men must lend a helping hand.
The processes by which vegetation accomplishes a new cover where the previous cover has been destroyed are
neither secret nor mysterious. All botany texts and a variety of other scientific treatises discuss the influences that
determine the development of plant communities. These factors have been so ably discussed elsewhere that there
is no necessity for my doing so here. It may be pertinent, however, to introduce some of the underlying principles
which determine the nature of plant successions as they occur.
Important among the life factors that occasion the growth of one plant as against another in a given location are
the requirements of the species for water and for heat. Although the temperature of the air is influenced to a certain
extent by the soil, we may pass it over, because it is not of major concern. Water, being literally managed by the