Richard Hurd, age 9 of Lyons, Nebr., for his question:

Is lightning really good for the soil?

Richard says the Old Timers tell him that lightning is good for the soil and he wonders if this is true. He thinks, perhaps, science and modern farming prove the Old Timers wrong, Andy says, not at all. Science proves that lightning is very, very good for the soil, If there were enough lightning, the farmer would not have to fertilize his land with nitrates. He would not have to plant a crop of peas or beans, clover or alfalfa to nourish his worn‑out. soil.

For lightning puts nitrogen into the soil and plants need nitrogen to make proteins and grow. We need proteins to grow and build strong muscles. Our bodies cannot make the proteins they need. We get our proteins from plants and from animals who have eaten plant proteins, These body‑building proteins are in the meat and dairy products of our daily diets. The animal world gets its proteins from the plant world. The plant world needs nitrogen to make proteins.

Nitrogen is an invisible, odorless ga.s and there is no shortage of it, More than three quarters of the air is nitrogen, In the atmosphere above every square mile of the earth there are about 24 million tons of nitrogen, Why don't the plants dust take the nitrogen they need from the air? The answer is, they cannot make use of nitrogen in the form of a gas. Nor can you drink hydrogen and oxygen, the gases from which water is made. Liquid water is a compound. It is made from particles, each one a bundle of one oxygen atom and two hydrogen atoms. Plants must have their nitrogen as a compound with, say, oxygen.

A flash of lightning may discharge enough electric power to lift lovely Omaha for a gear or more. This mighty power stirs up the gaseous atoms of the air.

Atoms of nitrogen and oxygen combine to form particles of nitric oxide. As it cools, this compound becomes nitrogen dioxide. The falling rain turns the nitrogen dioxide into a watery solution of nitric acid. Chemicals in the soil change the nitric acid into the nitrate compounds which the plants need to make proteins.

We say that the lightning fixes the nitrogen by turning it into compounds which plants can use. A great deal of nitrogen is fixed by lightning flashes, but not enough, The plants we see around us cannot fix the nitrogen they need. But certain bacteria, which are tiny plants, can do so. These bacteria form colonies in the roots of legume plants, such as peas and beans. This is why the farmer may plant a legume atop when his soil is poor in nitrogen chemicals, Nitrogen is also added to the soil in the fertilizers made from manures and other animal wastes,