oils are not suited to vetch. Lands that are too
poor to produce clovers will frequently yield fair crops of vetch. If
this is borne in mind, many poor soils may be wonderfully improved by
growing on them this valuable legume.

[Illustration: FIG. 235. VETCH]

Vetch needs a fine well-compacted seed-bed, but it is often sowed with
good results on stubble lands and between cotton and corn rows, where it
is covered by a cultivator or a weeder.

The seeds of the vetch are costly and are brought chiefly from Germany,
where this crop is much prized. The pods ripen so irregularly that they
have to be picked by hand.

In northern climates early spring sowing is found most satisfactory. In
southern climates the seeding is best done in the late summer or early
fall. As the vetch vines have a tendency to trail on the ground, it is
wisest to plant with the vetch some crop like oats, barley, rye, or
wheat. These plants will support the vetch and keep its vines from being
injured by falling on the ground. Do not use rye with vetch in the
South. It ripens too early to be of much assistance. If sowed with oats
the seeding should be at the rate of about twenty or thirty pounds of
vetch and about one and a half or two bushels of oats to the acre. Vetch
is covered in the same way as wheat and rye.

Few crops enrich soil more rapidly than vetch if the whole plant is
turned in. It of course adds nitrogen to the soil and at the same time
supplies the soil with a large amount of organic matter to decay and
change to humus. As the crop grows during the winter, it makes an
excellent cover to prevent washing. Many orchard-growers of the
Northwest find vetch the best winter crop for the orchards as well as
for the fields.

=Soy, or Soja, Bean.= In China and Japan the soy bean is grown largely
as food for man. In the United States it is used as a forage plant and
as a soil-improver. It bids fair to become one of the most popular of
the legumes. Like the cowpea, this bean is at home only in a warm
climate. Some of the early-ripening varieties have, however, been
planted with fair success in cold climates.

While there are a large number of varieties of the soy bean, only about
a dozen are commonly grown. They differ mainly in the color, size, and
shape of the seeds, and in the time needed for ripening. Some of the
varieties are more hairy than others.

Soy beans may take many places in good crop-rotations, but they are
unusually valuable