Agricultural Department Bombay Province. Bombay Dry Farming Research Scheme Progress Report 1940-41

The main change in the agronomic programme was the omission of the light shallow soil at Sholapur and the laying-out of a new complex experiment which combined the promising items of drfarming This was done according to the common programme of work approved by the Advisory Board of the Imperial Council of Agricultural Research in May 1939. [...] Study of Soil Moisture----Soil Moistures at Sholapur.— The soil moistures were determined in (a) the General Area under the Bombay Dry Farming Method and under the Cultivator's Method (b) in the Fallow series of the experimental area (c) in the Mulching and nomulching series and (d) in the Complex Experiment. [...] The moisture left in the soil at the end of the year was equal to 3.18" as the balance to be carried over for the year to follow. [...] In the case of the light shallow soil out of the total quantity of rain water 18.57" were found to have been lost by evaporation and only 0.57" was left over in the soil at the end of the year. [...] This was due to the fact that under the severe drought conditions of the year with so low a rainfall as 13.16 inches the cummulative effect of the annual additions of the manure in the surface soil layer of four inches proved deleterious and resulted in the comparatively dwarf plants.