Soil survey of Hunt County, Texas Page: 44 of 60
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42 BUREAU OF CHEMISTRY AND SOILS, 1934
The more sloping soils of the prairies, including the areas of
Houston clay, Sumter clay, Sumter clay loam, Crockett very fine
sandy loam, rolling phase, Crockett clay loam, eroded phase, and
Wilson clay loam, slope phase, are naturally unsuited to cropping
systems including largely the growing of cotton and other intertilled
crops that afford little protection from soil erosion. Houston
clay and Wilson clay loam, slope phase, are suited for use as general
cropland, as their productivity is high enough to warrant the
expense of terracing and the use of other methods for the control
of erosion, which are necessary for the successful production of
crops. The productivity of most areas of the other soils is too low
for their profitable use as cropland. and they are best used for
pasture. All these soils are potentially good for many pasture
plants, and, as they occur mostly in small areas associated with land
better suited for crops, they can well be utilized for pasture land.
The best suited and most largely used soils for the growing of
cotton are subject to injurious infestation of cotton root rot and
insects. Cotton on the Houston and related soils is especially infested
with the root rot disease which in some years lowers yields
greatly and also adversely affects the quality of the cotton produced.
The infestation seems to be very severe only on the heavy-textured
prairie soils. According to a survey made by the senior author late
in 1933, cotton on Houston black clay and Hunt clay in Hunt County
had an infestation of root rot of 11.3 percent. The infestation
apparently was slightly greater on the crop on Houston clay and
Sumter clay than it was on the smoother heavy-textured soils of
the prairies. Only about 1 percent of the cotton on Wilson clay was
infested. There was little infestation on the medium-textured soils
of the prairies and on the bottom-land soils, and none was observed
on the light-colored sandy soils.
Soils which produce the largest amount of foliage on cotton
appear to be those on which cotton is most affected by injury from
insects. For this reason, cotton on the highly productive bottomland
soils sometimes is ruined by insects.
Some of the agricultural practices that offer major possibilities
for the improvement of soil productivity are the eradication of
Johnson grass and Bermuda grass from cultivated fields, the improvement
of permanent pastures and the utilization of temporary
pasture crops, the control of erosion, the introduction of a legume
crop in the cropping system, the use of cover crops and green
manures, the control of cotton root rot and various insects and pests,
the growth of better adapted varieties of crops, and on some soils
the application of commercial fertilizers. All these problems and
many others are being studied by the Texas Agricultural Experiment
Station and the United States Department of Agriculture.
The following discussion is a very brief summary of some of the
more important research work. More complete information may
be obtained from the county agricultural agent and from various
State and Federal bulletins.
The results obtained at the cotton-breeding station of the Department
of Agriculture, located 2 miles southwest of Greenville, mainly
on Hunt clay, are applicable to the heavy-textured soils of the
prairies of Hunt County. Likewise, with the exception of slight
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Templin, E. H. (Edward Henry) & Marshall, R. M. (Richard Moon). Soil survey of Hunt County, Texas, book, February 1939; [Washington D.C.]. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth19778/m1/44/?q=tex-land: accessed July 16, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting UNT Libraries Government Documents Department.