67. "Sulphate of ammonia can do little for the germinating seed in dry weather, as it is not in an immediately available form; and, even after rain comes, it is some time before the sulphate of ammonia comes into play, so that the result is a diminished crop, or, perhaps, a failure.

68. "Sulphate of ammonia is more suitable than nitrate of soda for mixing with superphosphate and dissolved manures generally, as it is not decomposed thereby. It does not attract moisture so as to render the manure unfit for sowing.

69. Sulphate of ammonia has been found to check the growth of clover more effectively than nitrate of soda, if applied in excess, but in moderate quantity it is an excellent manure for old grass. It is not so suitable for application to leguminous crops, which are intolerant of strong nitrogenous manures, especially after the first period of their growth.

66

70. Pure dissolved bones has this advantage over bone meal, that it contains nitrogen in a soluble, and also in an insoluble, form so that it supplies the wants of the turnip at all periods of its growth; but it has usually the disadvantage of containing lumps of undissolved bone that are unavailable for the turnip crop.

71. "Insoluble nitrogenous manures are substances containing albuminoid matter. They are very suitable for wet districts, but none of them can be considered a manure until it is finely ground, or rotted, or dissolved.

72. "Dried blood and meat meal are supplied in a powdery condition, and are easily rotted in the soil. They are too slowly acting manures for cereal crops usually, but when applied to root crops they decompose in time to yield nitrogen to the plant during the latter part of the growing season.

73. "Horn dust is of various kinds. The only kind that has been successful is a fine sawdust, which is to be had only in small quantity. In that form it is a nitrogenous manure of the highest quality, capable of being used either for cereals or for root crops.

74. "All these nitrogenous matters, when dissolved in sulphuric acid along with phosphates, make manures whose nitrogen is rapidly available for the use of plants. They form the nitrogenous part of what is sold under the name of " dissolved bones," and are as active nitrogenous manures as the gelatine contained in bones which have been dissolved.

75. It seems to be with nitrogenous manures as it is with phosphates, they are nearly all good alike when they are dissolved. When they are reduced to an exceedingly fine powder they are also very good manures, especially in moist land, but they are of little use when undissolved and only coarsely ground."

76. Of the use of nitrogen, Warrington writes as follows: "Nitrogen applied as ammonium salts or nitrates will give all of its effect during the first year; forty-five to fifty per cent. of the nitrogen applied is, according to Lawes and Gilbert, recovered on an average in the increase. In the case of farm yard manure applied on heavy land at Rothamsted to wheat and barley, only about ten to fifteen per cent. of the nitrogen was recovered in the increase, but the effect on the barley continued many years after the application of the manure ceased. It is evident that a small quanity of an active manure will accomplish the same work as a large quantity of one less active."

77. Of the use of nitrate of soda, Warrington writes as follows:

"This manure, like the preceding (sulphate of ammonia), is valuable solely for its nitrogen. It is an excellent manure for all crops requiring artificial supplies of nitrogen, and especially of grain crops and mangels. For grain crops it is best employed together with a superphosphate. Nitrate of sodium should not be mixed with a damp superphosphate, else the nitric acid may be lost. It is best to mix the two immediately before use, or the superphosphate may be sown with the grain and the nitrate applied afterwards as a top-dressing." 78. In reviewing the experiments of Lawes and Gilbert, Prof. Atwater thus writes: "In Messrs. Lawes and Gilberts' experiments, the cereals have been most helped by nitrogen, next the phosphates and very little by potash; the legumes have responded to mineral manures and paid little heed to nitrogen except where on meadow land they have, under the influ-nce of nitrogenous manuring, gadually run out, and the grasses have taken their place just as they have replaced the grasses where mineral manures alone were used; turnips have done best with superphosphates, and potatoes, I think, have seemed to demand potash along with nitrogen and phosphate for their best development."

79. In reviewing a long series of experiments with different fertilizers, Prof. Atwater thus writes: "The experiments of these seasons (1878, 1879 and 1880) bear unanimous testimony to two things. The corn was helped but little by nitrogen and it gathered a good deal from natural scources. The nitrogen increased the crop enough to pay its cost in thirty trials out of one hundred and fifty, the pecuniary loss rose and fell with the amount of nitrogen used. With mineral fertilizers alone, the crop gathered by the above estimates, some sixty pounds of nitrogen per acre."

80. Of the use of nitrate of soda Prof. Goessmann writes as follows: "A liberal use of this saline compound, or of nitrogen compounds in general, tends to extend the period of vegetation and thus retard the ripening process. The later in the season the sodium nitrate is applied the more serious is its effects on the extension of the period of growth, and the more imminent the danger of obtaining unripe crops. An excessive amount of straw and a small yield of grain in case of our cereals and large watery roots deficient in sugar and such constituents as are formed during the later period of growth, are frequent but practical illustrations of this mode of action."

81. Sir J. Bennett Lawes writes as follows in relation to large applications of nitrogen: "These large applications of potash and phosphoric acid, although applied in the form of soluble compounds, appear to enter into very fixed combinations somewhat similar to those already existing in the soil, and in this respect they differ altogether from compounds of ammonia and nitric acid, as the latter appear to be either. washed away or destroyed, unless they are fixed by vegetation, while the former are fixed by the soil itself and are only taken out of it by means of vegetation."

82. In referring to the use of different kinds of fertilizers, the same authority writes as follows "Manures consisting of potash, phosphoric acid and ammonia or nitrates, appear competent to grow large crops of wheat continuously. A given weight of nitrogen, as nitric acid, has produced more growth in the wheat crop than the same weight of nitrogen in salts of ammonia. The amount of nitrogen supplied in the manures is very much in excess of the amount recovered by the increase in the crops."

83. A noted English writer states that "we estimate that about thirty pounds of nitrogen, as nitric acid, are liberated each year, of which the crop takes about twenty pounds and the drainage water ten pounds. There are several thousand pounds of nitrogen in combination with carbon still in the soil. It is evident, however, that the wheat crop cannot make use of this source of fertility, but is entirely dependent upon the limited amount of nitric acid available each year, of which the larger portion is liberated from the soil."

84. The same writer states: "Mineral manures do not, therefore, prevent the exhaustion of the soil, but they enable the plant to utilize the nitrogen which would otherwise be lost. This is very clearly shown by the fact that very large amounts of nitric acid pass away in the drainage water where we apply nitrates and ammonia every year without any minerals."

85. Prof. Lawes writes: "When ammonium salts are applied to land, the ammonia is at first retained by the soil, while the sulphuric acid and chlorine pass into the drainage water, chiefly as calcium salts. The conversion of ammonia into nitric acid commences almost immeiately after the application of ammonium salts to wet soil. The conversion is complete in a few weeks if wet weather follows. The nitrogen of rape-cake is more slowly converted into nitric acid."

86. Many of the so-called "waste products," which contain nitrogen or potash, are sold at prices much above their real value, or above their value when compared with the market rates for the same materials in the less adulterated commercial form.

87. In many cases these products are purchased and heavy freight (in addition to first cost) paid to the station of the consumer, when the same materials could have been purchased in some well-known fertilizer at less rates, and much handling saved.

88. Some chemicals which produce certain known results when separately applied to the soil will, when in state of mixture, produce much greater results.

89. This increase in the results produced is dependent, first, upon the completeness of the mixture, grinding together being much preferable, and, second, upon the time which has elapsed since they were brought together, it being an established fact that a certain amount of time is necessary for the chemical changes which are known to take place.

90. Thus, lime and salt, when applied separately, produce a given effect upon certain crops, but when thoroughly incorporated and mixed some six months before the application is made, are found to produce a much greater effect.

91. Some chemicals, in addition to the effect which their direct application may exert on the crop as direct plant food, also produce a visible effect by changing chemical compound in the soil, and by this change rendering their component parts available as plant food.

92. Thus the application of lime and the effects which follow cannot be attributed to the addition of lime as plant food. They are clearly due to the result of a chemical decomposition which the lime induces in the soil, and which in its results forms new compounds or releases the valuable portions of those already existing.

93. It is on account of this thorough mixture, induced by grinding the component parts together, and allowing them to thus lay for some time, that fertilizers mixed in bulk at the factory will always give bet9 BD. AG.

ter returns than those imperfectly mixed with a shovel upon the barn floor.

94. The economical utilization of any product as a fertilizer depends upon the freight, first cost and the percentage of the material needed which it may contain. The cost per ton may be small, but if it at the same time contains but a small portion of the substance actually wanted, it may still prove to be dear to the purchaser. Freight and handling play an important part in the first cost of fertilizers.

95. In addition to the first cost of his materials, the manufacturer is compelled to add commissions to agents, interest upon capital locked up by sales made on time and freight. When these are all added, the competition of the trade will often cut profits down to a low margin. 96. Certain compounds containing nitrogen have it in such a form that it is not readily lost. By the addition of certain chemicals it is possible to destroy that condition, and by a change of bases render it much more volatile and subject to loss.

97. On this account it is bad policy to mix wood ashes (unleached) or fresh lime with chicken manure or fertilizers containing nitrogen. The nitrogen is, by a change of base, permitted to pass into a more volatile form and passing off into the atmosphere. To prove this, mix a small portion of quicklime with chicken manure in a small box or bottle.

98. In all cases it is essential to the best success that all of the ingredients of a fertilizer should be in a finely pulverized condition, as well as in a state of thorough and complete mixture. Many scientific men state that South Carolina rock if pulverized to a sufficient degree of fineness will give nearly or quite as good results as if treated with acid. The main difference being that in the "raw" state it requires more water to render it soluble.

99. What has thus been urged for South Carolina rock is, to a certain extent, no doubt true as to other fertilizer materials and that we may assume that fine division, whether secured by mechanical or chemical action, is the one thing to be sought after.

100. That in the valuation of commercial and other fertilizers we are not justified in placing a low value upon vegetable or organic matter, since it is clearly shown that it is one source of ammonia and that its mechanical effect is very important also.

THE PRESERVATION OF BARN-YARD MANURE,

BY PROF. WM. FREAR, State College, Pennsylvania.

Within a comparatively recent period there has been a vast increase in the application of fertilizers upon the soil of our farms, whose original supply of assimilable plant-food had been heavily drained. In the earlier stages of this movement, attention and interest were chiefly centered upon the manure of home production; but latterly, the rapidly increasing production of commercial fertilizers has diverted attention from the manure produced upon the farm. Not only has the early skepticism concerning the practical utility of commercial fertilizers been completely overthrown, but many, following the bold leadership of Prof. Ville, have ventured to assert their complete independence of any form of fertilizer, except the concentrated, artifi

cial supplies. They oppose the general practice of that mixed system of farming which includes the raising of cattle, or the production of milk, and the dependence upon the manure thus made for the maintenance of fertility, claiming that it must necessarily be a losing system. They claim, apparently with much force, that it is impossible to increase the amount of plant-food on a poor farm by the simple return to the soil of the materials removed from it, much less by the return of only a part of what has been removed. Just here it must be recalled that the available plant-food in a cultivated soil is made up not only of that which has been added as fertilizer, but, also, of that which has been formed, by chemical decomposition and mechanical subdivision, from that great portion of the soil previously unfit for assimilation by the plants; it must further be remembered that the retention in the soil of a fair amount of humus, or organic matter formed by the decomposition of roots, straw, etc., is a very important element in the maintenance of its fertility.

It would seem, then, that the value of farm-yard manure cannot be measured simply by its content in nitrogen, potash and phosphoric acid. The problem of fertilization is, therefore, more complex than might be supposed, and it will be safe, while admitting the great utility of the commercial fertilizers as additions to the manure of home production, to regard the extreme conclusions of the Ville school as deserving experiment, rather than as proven to be best for general adoption under our present agricultural conditions.

Under any circumstances, however, and with every system of farming, the prompt return to the soil of the largest possible portion of those materials removed therefrom, that cannot more profitably be sold, must be regarded as essential; i. e., whether the amount be great or small, it should be returned in the most economical manner. It is a well-known fact to all observing farmers, that the practical agricul turist who accumulates wealth, whether in the shape of cash, stock, acres or fertility, does so, not by great discoveries, nor in great, sums, but by constant vigilance, and the most careful, intelligent economy in matters of apparently small importance; while a poor farmer is marked by his heedlessness of the little things, even more than by his lack of the great and costly appliances of his art.

Observation leads to the conclusion that in no matter is there more ignorance and more unconscious waste than in the management of the stable manure, The character of this manure will vary with the feeding-stuff's used, the kind of stock fed and the litter used; all of which have great importance in any study of the manure question; it is, however, to the influence of the methods of its preservation upon the composition of the manure, rather than to the materials employed in its production, that I desire to call attention.

Before entering upon any discussion of the relative merits of different methods of preservation, it may be well to glance briefly at the character of the substances composing yard manure.

Dr. Voelcker *analyzed a mixture of horse, cow and pig dung with straw litter, and found in one thousand pounds the following weights of various substances:

*Journal of the Royal Agricultural Society, series I, vol. XVII, p. 191 seq.