FERTILIZERS 
 
 WHERE THE MATERIALS COMES FROM. 
 
 WHERE TO GET THEM IN THE CHEAPEST FORM. 
 
 HOW TO COMPOUND FORMULAS, ETC., ETC. 
 
 BY 
 
 J. J. H. GREGORY, A.M., 
 
 AUTHOR OT WORKS ON CABBAGE-RAISING, ONION-RAISING, SQUASH-RAISING, BTC. 
 
 BOSTON: 
 
 PRESS OF RAND, AVERY, & COMPANY. 
 
Copyright, 1885, 
 
 By J. J. H. GREGORY. 
 
-»■ «?r;oN 
 
 1833 
 
 FERTILIZERS:' 
 
 yTRSTT; GF TT.T.T N 
 
 WHERE THE MATERIALS COME FROM. 
 
 WHERE TO GET THEM IN THE CHEAPEST FORM. 
 
 HOW TO COMPOUND FORMULAS, ETC., ETC. 
 
 J. J. H. GREGORY, A.M., 
 
 $ learning a xiis JCabor. $ 
 
 | LIBRARY | 
 
 I University of Illinois. | 
 
 ^ CLASS. BOOK. VOLUME. ^ 
 
 I f 
 
 W Books are not to be taken from the Library. W 
 ^ Accession No. ^ 
 
 OF T AND r ERY, & COMPANY. 
 
By 
 
 COPYKIGHT, 1885, 
 
 J. J. H. GREGORY. 
 
(cZ\.& 
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 This treatise is by a farmer for farmers. Using forty 
 or fifty tons of commercial fertilizers on my own crops 
 annually, I have been compelled to “ book myself up,” as 
 the phrase is, — to learn the cheapest market in which to 
 buy the elements, the best way to combine these, and the 
 wisest way to apply them to the different crops of the farm. 
 This treatise is the result of the study of various works 
 on agricultural chemistry, especially the excellent reports 
 that have been sent out from our agricultural stations 
 by Professors Johnson and Atwater, Goessmann, Dabney, 
 Caldwell, and others, to whom our sense of indebtedness 
 will be measured by the growth of our intelligence. This 
 study, combined with personal observation and experience, 
 makes up my little book. My treatise is not a work on 
 barn manure : it is confined, for the most part, to fertilizers. 
 It can perform no miracles : to ask that it shall show every 
 one the road to success in the profitable raising of his 
 crops would be as reasonable as was the search of the 
 alchemist of old for the wonderful alembic that was to 
 transm ' to gold. The whole matter of soil 
 
 iii 
 
IV 
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 action and plant-growth is wonderfully complex ; and so 
 far from the old axiom being true, that any man can be 
 a farmer, we find that farming, in the problems it presents 
 for solution, is a calling that challenges the best ability 
 and the best culture to be found among men. To give a 
 history of the three principal elements which enter into 
 the composition of fertilizers, to discuss their relations to 
 plant-growth in the various forms in which they exist, to 
 tell in what form and where they may be obtained at the 
 lowest rates, to tell how they may be combined and 
 applied in the wisest way, brother farmers, is the object 
 of this treatise. Should it prove desirable to enlarge the 
 subject, I may take up barn and various other manures in 
 another work. 
 
 To those who desire to study the subject of plants and 
 plant-growth more extensively, I would recommend such 
 excellent works as “ How Crops Grow ” and “ How Crops 
 Feed,” by Professor Johnson ; “ Botanical Text-Book,” by 
 Professor Grey ; and “ Harris on Manures.” 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 Chemists tell us that water, and this air around us, that 
 we can neither see nor grasp, and which in all our every- 
 day calculations of space we take no account of, make up 
 from eighty-eight to ninety-nine per cent of our crops, our 
 trees, or any form of vegetable growth. Practically, we 
 know this is so ; for we can bring out in a bushel-basket 
 all the ashes made from a load of wood that it might take 
 a couple of yoke of oxen to draw in. A wood cord is about 
 one hundred bushels ; in the ashes which contain the min- 
 erals that entered into the make-up of that wood, we get 
 not more than two per cent of this. The great remainder, 
 after yielding that heat which the sun has fed to it for, it 
 may be, a hundred years, in the form of vapor and gases 
 hurries up the chimney, to return to mother-air, from 
 whence they came. Plant-life builds up the mighty tree, 
 borrowing almost nothing from the soil. It is the weight 
 of the air and the water present in its structure that our 
 oxen strain under when hauling to mill the trunk of some 
 huge veteran of the forest. All that it has taken from 
 the soil to make up its huge bulk the driver might carry 
 in a bag on his shoulder, and then have to go some distance 
 to get an appetite for breakfast. In brief, to express it in 
 
 l 
 
2 
 
 FERTILIZERS. 
 
 a familiar way, soil does but little more than help plants 
 stand upright; while water and air, obeying chemical 
 laws, build up their structure. And what is soil? It is 
 the result of the destruction of the rocks mingled with 
 vegetable waste ; it is the turning of all life, organic and 
 inorganic, into its original elements ; it is the great grave- 
 yard of creation ; it is the great mine of the world, out 
 from which come the food of all animal and vegetable 
 life, the wherewithal they shall be clothed, the means of 
 shelter and protection from heat, cold, and wet ; it is 
 Mother Earth, from whom all organized life springs, and 
 to whom, after completing its little round, all matter that 
 enters therein returns, to repose a while within her bosom, 
 there to rest and refresh itself before entering into new 
 forms, and running another course of vitality. 
 
 “ The earth is my mother,” said Red Jacket, the Indian 
 orator, at the Great Council, declining a chair offered him : 
 “I will rest upon her bosom.” Yes, she is the material 
 mother of all organized life ; and, when their course is 
 ended, all her children go home to her. 
 
 The giant of the forest may span his thousand years 
 of time, and, towering upward a hundred feet above his 
 fellows, may seem to despise his humble origin ; but his 
 mother is patiently waiting for him : and, hoary with 
 years, worn and weary, seeking rest, he bows his lofty 
 head, falls upon her breast, and receives her final embrace. 
 Man himself, standing at the head of all organized life, 
 in sleep, imago mortis , reclines by instinct on her bosom ; 
 and, when comes the final hour, his material self by loving 
 hands is gently lowered into her yearning care, “ dust unto 
 dust.” If any man could really believe that this is the 
 final end, he would that instant die of horror, or become 
 insane. The cheer that every good deed leaves in our 
 hearts is full of the instinct of immortality. 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 3 
 
 If we give the bushel of ashes into the hands of the 
 chemist, to tell us what it is made of, he will return us 
 silicon, potassium, calcium, phosphorus, sodium, alumin- 
 ium, sulphur, iron, chlorine, magnesium. These are the 
 elements that all plants take from the soil. The soil itself 
 obtained them originally from the ledges of solid rock, 
 which through eons of years have been slowly disinte- 
 grating and decomposing. Geology tells us, that, by the 
 action of the drift waves of ancient eras, mountains of 
 water six thousand feet or more in height swept from the 
 north, breaking down, filling up, and smoothing off, the 
 ragged, craggy surface of the ancient lava-covered earth ; 
 by later glacial action, and that of water and frost, which 
 extend into the human period, the rocks have been ground 
 up, and scattered over a large portion of the surface of 
 our planet in gravelly hills and plains, covered more or 
 less by vegetable matter, through which protrude, in places, 
 the rocky ribs of the ancient earth. This soil is but a 
 sprinkling on the surface of our globe. At a depth of but 
 a few hundred feet, at the utmost, on any spot of its mil- 
 lions of miles of surface, we would strike rock, solid to 
 the great lava centres. 
 
 The principal ledges from which have come originally 
 the mineral matter of the soil, are of the granite class. 
 These yield the minerals felspar, mica, hornblende, and 
 quartz ; and they, the silicon, potash, iron, alumina, soda, 
 lime, and manganese. The sedimentary rocks, of which the 
 various slates are a type, have the particles in a finer form 
 than they exist in the parent primary rocks ; and hence the 
 soils formed from these, such as the clays, have the mineral 
 constituents in a finer condition. But the finest subdivis- 
 ion of all, in which the mineral matter of the soil exists, 
 is that supplied by dead plant and animal life, into whose 
 structure the minerals entered in so fine a state as to be 
 held in solution by water. 
 
4 
 
 FERTILIZERS. 
 
 In felspar and mica we have the great natural store- 
 houses of potash ; the former containing seventeen per 
 cent, and the latter nine per cent. It has been estimated 
 from tests on a small scale, that, in soils from granite 
 taken to the depth of twenty inches, on an acre of land 
 the potash from the felspar alone is over one million two 
 hundred thousand pounds. What this means may be in- 
 ferred when we consider that it has been computed that 
 two cubic feet of felspar contains sufficient potash to 
 supply the wants of an acre of young oaks for five years. 
 
 Not only is the soil of the earth to be supplied with 
 mineral matter, but the ocean also, to enable her to furnish 
 food for her many forms of marine life, both animal and 
 vegetable. Water, percolating through the soil, with the 
 help of the carbonic acid it holds in solution, which it has 
 derived mostly from the air, dissolves an infinitesimally 
 small portion of mineral ingredients, and carries them to 
 the streams and rivers ; and these run on, with their invisi- 
 ble freight of soda, potash, chlorine, and other minerals, to 
 the ocean. Here, nothing but water being evaporated, the 
 mineral strength increases ; and in the kelps, sea-mosses, 
 rock-weed, and eel-grass which we gather along the shore, 
 and carry back on the land to manure our farms, or in 
 the waste fish we handle, we find the identical manurial 
 elements that exist in the various land plants which we 
 feed to our animals. And we find, moreover, that these 
 elements are about equally well proportioned for plant- 
 food. 
 
 The rocks of the little State of Massachusetts have 
 locked up in them, it is safe to say, all the potash, the sili- 
 con, the iron, the alumina, the soda, necessary to supply 
 the population of the whole earth, from now to the end of 
 time, with all of these ingredients that enter into their 
 daily food, provided they were made soluble, and were 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 5 
 
 not wasted. The soil of Massachusetts could doubtless 
 grow food sufficient to feed a population of a million and 
 a half of inhabitants, without a spoonful of manure being 
 needed beyond her own natural resources, and continue to 
 do this through all time, could, from the beginning, all ex- 
 cremental waste made from the consumption of such food 
 have been returned to it. We say that soil is an accumu- 
 lation of broken rock, decomposed minerals, and disor- 
 ganized organic matter, the waste of Nature’s workshop, — 
 a dead mass. And so it is, from the organic stand-point. 
 
 But there is a chemical as well as an organic life ; and 
 from this stand-point, in the loam we turn with the plough, 
 apparently so inert and dead, there is a life of unceasing 
 activity throughout the growing season, which rests only 
 when paralyzed by the frosts of winter. So complicated 
 is it in its action and re-action, its marriages and divorces, 
 in utter disregard of all moral laws in seeking its affini- 
 ties, that it presents some of the most complicated prob- 
 lems to be found in physical science. The utmost that 
 has been attained is the possible and probable. The man 
 who could tell the world exactly the composition of a rod 
 of ground, and the daily changes that took place in it 
 during the growing season, ai}d how these affect the ma- 
 nures applied, and how they affect it, and how the results 
 of these actions and re-actions affect the growing crop, 
 would take his place among the immortals without a dis- 
 senting voice from among his fellow-men. 
 
 Chemical action is mineral instinct , or, more accurately, 
 a demonstration of the existence of such instinct. 
 
 Higher than mineral instinct stands plant-life. Plants 
 have more than life, they have intelligent volition. Plant- 
 life builds up the structure ; while plant instinct, active at 
 the little spongioles, dissolves from the rocks, or selects 
 from the soil, with unerring accuracy, the materials needed. 
 
6 
 
 FERTILIZERS. 
 
 The order in creation, then, is, that the rocks supply the 
 minerals ; plants feed on these minerals ; animals feed on 
 these plants ; while omnivorous man, lord of all, feeds on 
 both minerals and plants. 
 
 Chemists have settled the fact that most of the dozen 
 elements that enter into the composition of plants are 
 found in sufficient quantity in almost all soils, leaving but 
 potash, nitrogen, and phosphoric acid as the three essen- 
 tials, more or less of each of which, as a general rule, we 
 farmers must supply to the soil if we plant for a crop ; 
 though on some soils, such as muck meadows, lime and 
 silicon in some form may be necessary adjuncts. We pro- 
 pose to discuss these, and the sources from which they are 
 obtained. 
 
 Before taking up in detail the three essential elements 
 of plant-food, let us here discuss the difference that is 
 assumed to exist between them as they exist in barn 
 manure and commercial fertilizers. 
 
 WHAT IS THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN BARN MANURE AND 
 COMMERCIAL FERTILIZERS ? 
 
 All plant-food is manure ; and all manure is plant-food, 
 whether it is in the form of the artificial products, — which 
 are known among farmers as “ artificial manures,” “ chemi- 
 cal fertilizers,” — or is the natural product of the barn 
 yard : and the feeding value of each is measured in the same 
 way ; viz., by the quantity they contain of the three essen- 
 tial elements, viz., nitrogen, potash, and phosphoric acid, 
 and the digestible condition in which these elements exist. 
 The great bugbear dealers in fertilizers have to contend 
 with in dealing with us farmers is, the deeply rooted belief 
 that the only real manure is that which comes out of the 
 barnyard, and that all other forms in which it is presented 
 are mere makeshifts. 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 7 
 
 Where do the fertilizing elements in barn manure come 
 from ? From the food animals eat. But do all the fertiliz- 
 ing elements in the food find their way to the manure ? 
 Certainly not ; a portion of them are used to promote the 
 growth of the animal, going into its flesh and bones. Is 
 there not, then, in the body of the animal, which has in it 
 a part of the fertilizing elements contained in the food, 
 plant-food also, as well as in the manure that passes 
 through it ? Every farmer will assent to this. As it has 
 less water and waste in its composition than the manure 
 itself, is it not more concentrated plant-food? Now, it 
 is these bones, blood, flesh, and other waste that are used 
 in fertilizers as one of the principal sources for ammonia 
 and phosphoric acid, — ammonia in the dried blood and 
 flesh, and phosphoric acid in the bones, — to carry back to 
 earth the plant-food received from it. What is the differ- 
 ence, then, between using the manure of an animal as 
 plant-food, and using the animal himself as plant-food? 
 Simply, that we get more water and waste in the one case 
 than in the other. 
 
 Go into the fields, and study the crops of the Great 
 Farmer of the universe. From the majestic Sequoia , that 
 tower toward high heaven, even to the tiny hyssop, that 
 creepeth on the wall, observe the green mantle of his 
 mighty domain thrown over the mountains that span a con- 
 tinent, and trailing along their thousand valleys, contrast- 
 ing, in its vast amplitude, with the patches of soil on which 
 dwell nations, covering every latitude and enveloping all 
 continents in its mighty folds up to the great icy circles. 
 How does the Great Farmer raise his crops? Take your 
 spade, and dig down into the soil. Do you find any barn 
 manure there ? Go out on the boundless prairies of the far 
 West, “ where bounteous nature only, tills the willing soil.” 
 Do you find any barn manure there ? They waved their 
 
8 
 
 FERTILIZERS. 
 
 oceans of verdure thousands of years before the human 
 era. Enter the limitless woods, and ask the giant pines 
 for the secret of their towering robustness. Was it barn 
 manure ? 
 
 Says Bruckner, “Farmers, accustomed to think of ma- 
 nure as a bulky article, want bulk for their money. They 
 are slow to realize that a little of the substance needed is 
 better than a good deal that is not needed.” 
 
 I will say, at the outset, that this little treatise is not 
 designed to be a tilt against barnyard manure : that will 
 always have its place in agriculture, as I find, myself, in 
 the great quantities I use annually in my own farming 
 operations. But I would like to see the circulars of some 
 of the dealers in fertilizers take a little bolder stand, and 
 not say, that, after we have used all our barn manure, theyi 
 comes the time to buy fertilizers, but to declare that there 
 are crops which can be raised decidedly cheaper on fertil- 
 izers, besides ripening earlier (as corn), and being of 
 better quality (as potatoes), and that it would always be 
 decidedly better to use a part or all of fertilizers on such 
 crops, and give what manure we have remaining to the 
 acres of grass-lands that would be fertilized by it on every 
 farm. I contend for a broad handling of this subject of 
 plant-food, and a recognition of the true value of it in 
 every form in which it exists. 
 
 WHAT IS BARNYARD MANURE? 
 
 I took a little of it, fresh from the horse-stall, and dried 
 all the water out of it on the hearth, and was surprised at 
 the result. On breaking it up fine, all I could find, by the 
 closest scrutiny with the naked eye, was a mass of bits of 
 hay, ranging from a third of an inch long to so small as to 
 be barely visible , and I will defy any one with the naked 
 eye to find any thing else. Many of the fragments of the 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 9 
 
 hay had suffered so little change, that they yet shone 
 in the light. The whole mass had a yellowish color, and 
 smelt as manure smells ; but the puzzle was, to find any 
 thing in it that could be called manure. There were frag- 
 ments of hay, a slight color, and nothing else. Now, 
 where was the plant-food in it? The potash, ammonia, 
 and phosphoric acid evidently must have been hidden 
 among, or soaked into, the fragments of hay. I found, by 
 weighing it before and after it had dried, that it lost 
 seven-tenths of its original weight ; in other words, seven- 
 tenths of its weight was water. Now, fresh barnyard 
 manure has been analyzed, and found to contain the 
 following kind and quantity of elements : — 
 
 Water 71.3 
 
 Nitrogen ......... 0.5 
 
 Silica and insoluble matter . . . . . .10.5 
 
 Alumina and oxide of iron 0.7 
 
 Lime . . . . . . . . . .0.5 
 
 Potash 0.4 
 
 Soda 0.1 
 
 Phosphoric acid . . . . . . . .0.5 
 
 Chlorine . . . . . . . . .0.1 
 
 Now, taking a cord of average stable manure, which 
 will average in weight about 4,500 pounds, we should 
 have in it 3,208 pounds of water, 22i pounds of nitrogen, 
 47 2i pounds of silica, 31 i pounds of alumina and iron, 
 22 i pounds of lime, 13i pounds of magnesia, 18 pounds of 
 potash, 4i pounds of soda, 4i pounds of sulphuric acid, 
 22i pounds of phosphoric acid, and 4J pounds of chlorine. 
 Taking a common one-horse load of two cord-feet, and it 
 would contain, of water, 802 pounds ; of nitrogen, about 5 & 
 pounds ; silica, about 118 pounds ; of alumina, 6i pounds ; 
 lime, 3i pounds ; magnesia, 3 i pounds ; potash, 4J pounds ; 
 
10 
 
 FERTILIZERS. 
 
 soda, 1 pound ; sulphuric acid, 1 pound ; phosphoric acid, 
 5J pounds ; chlorine, 1 pound. 
 
 Now, while you are urging on the faithful old horse, 
 sweating and tugging at his load through the mud, into 
 the soft ploughed ground, where the wheels sink nearly 
 to the hubs, put on your thinking-cap, and consider that 
 in that load you are teaming 802 pounds of water on your 
 land ; and what in the world do we want to do that for, 
 with the ground already so wet that we don’t dare stick a 
 plough into it, and are waiting anxiously for the sun to 
 look out with power, and dry it up? You are teaming 14 
 pounds of silica, which is another name for sand, — carrying 
 coals to Newcastle ; for, nine cases out of ten, the soil has 
 already a good deal more sand in its composition than you 
 want there. Of the iron, lime, soda, and chlorine, already, 
 as a rule, the soil has all it needs ; leaving but the nitrogen, 
 the potash, and the phosphoric acid as the only parts of 
 the big load that are really needed by the crop, no matter 
 what that is to be. And the 5i pounds of nitrogen, as far 
 as weight goes, would not be a heavy load for one coat- 
 pocket, nor the 5J pounds of phosphoric acid for another, 
 nor the 4 \ pounds of potash for the third. However, there 
 is a little of fiction in this ; for though it is literally true that 
 all there is of value in that horse-load of manure for the pro- 
 duction of whatever crop you intend to plant, is the nitro- 
 gen, potash, and phosphoric acid, which altogethr weigh but 
 15J pounds, still, it is practically not possible to carry them 
 to the field in a pure form : yet in the form of sulphate of 
 ammonia for nitrogen, phosphate of lime from bones, and 
 muriate of potash for potash, they would altogether weigh 
 52 pounds, and might easily be carried in a bushel-basket, 
 which they would but little more than half fill, and yet 
 have in them all the manure value contained in that two 
 feet of manure which the old horse is tugging at. 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 11 
 
 Why should we farmers insist upon it, that bulk is 
 necessary in manure? We do not so insist when we use 
 ashes, lime, or plaster; but then, we look upon them — 
 at least, the two latter — as agricultural miracles, though 
 there is nothing miraculous about them. If bulk is so 
 desirable in feeding crops, then why not, in feeding our- 
 selves corn, eat stalk, cob, and husk ? or, with the kernel 
 of wheat, eat the straw and husk which grew with it? 
 Just as the store of the apothecary, in the neat jars and 
 phials on his long, narrow shelves, supplies us all that is 
 really valuable in a mass of medicinal herbs that in their 
 natural state would fill his shop solid full many times 
 over, so in commercial fertilizers we find concentrated all 
 that is valuable as plant-food in a mass of barn manure a 
 hundred times as bulky. 
 
 The objection sometimes urged against the use of fer- 
 tilizers, that they do not leave so much food in the ground 
 for the crop that follows, is, I consider, an argument for 
 them. The plant-food in them is in so digestible a condi- 
 tion, that the crop we plant can get about all of it : whereas, 
 in using barn manure, the food is not all in such condition ; 
 and to get the same result the first season, we must put 
 on more manure than the crop would need, provided the 
 ingredients became plant-food the same season. Fertilizers 
 in some form can be made to last, like barn manure, and 
 feed several successive crops with a single application, if it 
 is desired. For instance, in ashes and bone we have all 
 the three elements for a complete manure. Now apply an 
 extra quantity of the ashes, and apply a portion of the 
 bone in a coarse state. Ashes are always enduring in 
 their effect ; and the coarse bone will be years in decaying, 
 and setting free nitrogen and phosphoric acid. 
 
12 
 
 FERTILIZERS. 
 
 HUMUS. 
 
 There is, however, a value in barn manure in addition 
 to its fertilizing properties. Its bulk has a mechanical 
 effect on the soil, improving heavy soils, and lightening 
 the texture of all soils, — a fact of especial value to market 
 gardeners in their early crops. By its partial decomposi- 
 tion, it adds to the mass of dark-brown earth which we 
 so especially notice in old gardens, and which goes under 
 the name of humus. Humus is dead vegetable and animal 
 matter in process of decay. In the surface twelve inches 
 of good soil, there is, in a latent condition, about fifteen 
 hundred pounds of phosphoric acid, fifteen hundred pounds 
 of potash, and seventeen hundred pounds of lime. Car- 
 bonic acid changes these into plant-food. Now, humus, 
 by its decay, develops carbonic acid, and so brings about 
 the decomposition of this latent food. Wet weather favors 
 this action. That carbonic acid has this power to set free 
 plant-food in the soil, has been proved by the experiments 
 of Professor Stockhardt. Our crops take up only a small 
 portion of the fertilizers we apply before the nutrient sub- 
 stances they contain become insoluble. The humus keeps 
 them in a soluble condition, which is an argument for the 
 use of barn manure, muck, or the ploughing-under of sod 
 or green crops, in connection with the use of fertilizers. 
 It acts as a sponge, to absorb and hold moisture in low, 
 black soils, which are made up of dead vegetable matter 
 in a state of semi-decay, halfway towards coal, — a carbo- 
 naceous mass of stems, roots, and leaves. Burnt, it makes 
 an ashes red, from the presence of iron, having but one- 
 sixth the potash to be found in hard-wood ashes. The 
 trouble with the humus of soil of a mucky nature for till- 
 age purposes is, that when dry it takes up water very 
 slowly ; and it takes, therefore, a good deal of rain to 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 13 
 
 moisten it : while, on the other hand, when wet, it keeps 
 wet and cold too long for the health of vegetation. With- 
 out draining, manure is a waste on such soils. I once top- 
 dressed such a meadow for two or three years, to get but 
 wild dandelion, that was not worth the money. I deepened 
 the outlet, and now can cut three good crops of grass from 
 it every year. 
 
 Humus holds a great store of carbonic acid ; which de- 
 composes the minerals in the soil, setting free potash and 
 phosphoric acid. It also holds latent nitrogen, sometimes 
 as high as three per cent, which is six times as much as 
 in average stable manure. This is made plant-food by the 
 application of lime or carbonate of potash. It is the great 
 argument for the use of barn manure in preference to 
 commercial fertilizers, that it forms humus ; but we can 
 gain the same end by turning under a grass or clover sod, 
 cow-pease, or a green crop, and these we can raise by com- 
 mercial fertilizers. 
 
 Humus is not in itself plant-food. It is not necessary 
 for the yield of heavy crops. 
 
 ARE FERTILIZERS BUT STIMULANTS? 
 
 The old-fashioned farmer is apt to look askance on this 
 new-fangled fashion of manuring, call fertilizers “ medi- 
 cine, stimulants,” “ a sure way to run out the land.” 
 
 To continually apply but a single one of the three ele- 
 ments which enter into the complete manure, and especially 
 if that one should be nitrogen, and for a series of years be 
 in marked excess of the other two, would in the end, sooner 
 or later, prove that the old farmer was right in his conclu- 
 sion, however faulty he might be in his reasoning. Let 
 me here emphasize the fact repeatedly proved, and that 
 squares with common sense ; viz., that the one of the three 
 
14 
 
 FERTILIZERS. 
 
 elements, nitrogen, potash, or phosphoric acid, of which the 
 soil has the least, will always be the measure of the crop. 
 
 A hundred pounds of potash applied would not give a 
 larger yield than five pounds (and so of the other two 
 elements) if there is not a proportionate increase of the 
 other elements. 
 
 Says Professor Atwater, in his generalizations from over 
 a hundred carefully studied experiments, “ Either the com- 
 bined testimony of these experiments, similar ones else- 
 where, and the best experience, are totally false, or chemical 
 fertilizers bring larger, better, and even surer crops than 
 farm manure. . . . Artificial fertilizers rightly used must 
 prove among the most potent means for the restoration of 
 our agriculture.” The professor makes this general rec- 
 ommendation : “For general farming, at a distance from 
 the large markets, the chief use of commercial fertilizers 
 should be to supplement the manure of the farm. The 
 right way is, to make the most and best manure that is 
 practicable upon the farm, and piece out with such com- 
 mercial fertilizers as experiments and experience prove 
 profitable. At the same time, there are many cases, espe- 
 cially near cities, where every thing depends on getting 
 the largest and best (and earliest) yield, where the more 
 exclusive use of chemical fertilizers is advisable.” This 
 is sound sense ; but I would modify it somewhat by advis- 
 ing to use fertilizers on leacliy soil in preference to barn 
 manure, depending on occasional laying-down to grass to 
 improve the texture of such soil. Also, as a rule, to de- 
 pend on fertilizers for the vegetable and grain crops, and 
 give the manure to the grass crop, ploughing under a good 
 sward to enrich the land with humus, when the grass 
 crop is as heavy as a ton to the acre, and not waiting till 
 you can span between the blades. 
 
 The celebrated experiments of Mr. Lawes of Rotliann 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 15 
 
 sted, Eng., when he raised wheat for twenty years in 
 succession, depending wholly on chemical fertilizers, the 
 same amount each year, with the results, that, where the 
 first ten years the average was twenty-nine bushels per 
 acre, the second ten the average was forty-one bushels 
 per acre, ought forever to settle the “ stimulant and medi- 
 cine ” theory. Professor Atwater says, further, “ That a 
 great deal of successful farm experience goes to show that 
 artificial fertilizers may take the place of farm manures, 
 there is no question. The experience and experimenting 
 that bear on this point are of too great accuracy, too long 
 continuance, and too large amount, to be ignored, and the 
 results too decisive to be derided. Nor is there in the 
 results of the best scientific investigators any thing antago- 
 nistic to the doctrine.” 
 
 To sum the matter up, the arguments for the use of fer- 
 tilizers are, (1) As a rule, they cost considerably less to 
 produce the same crop results. (2) They are much more 
 cheaply transported; and, containing the fertilizing ele- 
 ments in so condensed a form, the whole handling of them 
 is much cheaper. (3) They enable the farmer to cultivate 
 much larger areas. (4) They enable us to feed just the 
 proportion of each of the three elements the crop needs. 
 
 (5) They ripen crops earlier, and so practically prolong 
 the season, making the raising of some varieties possible 
 when before their use they could not wisely be risked. 
 
 (6) They improve the quality of potatoes and grain. (7) 
 They virtually bring outlying fields nearer to the farm. 
 (8) They have indirectly raised farmers to a higher intel- 
 lectual level by stimulating them to acquire more infor- 
 mation, and a clearer insight into the laws which govern 
 plant-growth. (9) They lessen our crop of weeds, as, 
 unlike barn manure, they carry with them no weed-seed 
 into the soil. 
 
16 
 
 FERTILIZERS. 
 
 POTASH. 
 
 Potash is the element potassium combined with oxygen 
 — “ potassium oxide ” it is called by the agricultural 
 chemists. Potassium itself is but a curiosity of the labora- 
 tory ; for it can be kept pure only by excluding all air, and 
 is therefore only to be found in the bottle of the chemist. 
 The name “ potash ” was given it because it was made in 
 iron pots from ashes. 
 
 In Canada and other primitive countries, in clearing the 
 land, the trees having been felled, piled, and burnt, the 
 ashes are collected, mixed with about one-twentieth of 
 lime, and placed in half-barrels, with false bottoms perfo- 
 rated with holes, and covered with straw. They are 
 drenched with water ; and in an hour or two the water is 
 drawn off into shallow iron pans, and evaporated. The^' 
 crude potash obtained is purified by heat on the floor of a 
 furnace, where most of the sulphur and water is driven 
 off, making the pearl ash of commerce. 
 
 Potash is a most caustic, biting alkali, dissolving and 
 decomposing all organic structures it comes in contact 
 with. It is one of the most powerful bases ; in other 
 words, it is a vigorous, unprincipled chemical thief, seizing 
 upon, and absorbing into itself, the acids it finds combined 
 with various saline compounds. Pure water could not 
 dissolve the potash as it exists in the particles of felspar 
 and mica that are found in the soil ; but, taking carbonic 
 acid from the air, it has the power of dissolving the sili- 
 cate of potash, leaving the quartz and alumina to form the 
 clays. Caustic lime also has this power. The silica, 
 combined with the potash, preferring the lime, divorces 
 itself from the potash, and, marrying the lime, sets the 
 potash free. In the vegetable kingdom it is held by 
 plants, while in the process of growth, in a soluble state, 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 17 
 
 combined with oxalic, tartaric, silicic, and sulphuric acids. 
 When wood is burnt, these acids are decomposed; and, 
 the potash combining with carbonic acid, we have the 
 common form of carbonate of potash. Potash is not only 
 one of the three essentials for all plant-growth, but it is 
 also found in the fruits, vegetables, and grains. The 
 grape, the apple, the potato, are illustrations. The ashes 
 of bean and pea vines, the potato-vine, and beet-leaves, 
 are especially rich in potash ; while corn-cobs and aspara- 
 gus stalks yield an enormous proportion, though but a 
 small amount compared with their bulk. The principal 
 sources from which we obtain potash are, India, from 
 which comes the nitrate of potash ; Germany, from which 
 come the sulphates, muriates, kainite, kruget, etc. (all of 
 them products of the famous Stassfurt deposit), wood 
 ashes (which includes those from the brick-kiln and lime- 
 kiln), burnt tan, logwood, etc., and a limited amount 
 from the burnt hulls of cotton-seed. The potash in all 
 these forms comes originally, as we have already stated, 
 from the Creator’s great storehouse, the felspar and mica 
 bearing ledges, with the soils formed from their disintegra- 
 tion and decomposition. From the nitrate of potash is 
 made the saltpetre of commerce. Being costly, it is rarely 
 used for agricultural purposes, though, to a limited extent, 
 a waste product enters the market. 
 
 The Stassfurt mines of Germany were originally opened 
 for salt-mines and what was at first looked upon as a 
 worthless waste, the wand of Chemistry pointed out as by 
 far the most valuable product. These mines make, I am 
 informed, the centre of a vast basin, many miles in diam- 
 eter, which is believed to have been the bed of an ancient 
 salt sea. The various salts, from their composition and 
 the order of their formation, are believed by men of science 
 to have resulted from the drying-up of this sea. The de- 
 
18 
 
 FERTILIZERS. 
 
 posit appears to be inexhaustible in its extent. The gen- 
 eral name given to the potash-bearing mass is carnallite, 
 from the pinkish color which it bears. Most of the prod- 
 ucts marketed are made from the original material of the 
 bed by chemical processes, which, as is common in old 
 countries, are kept well-guarded secrets. It comes to this 
 country in different grades of muriate, sulphate, and kai- 
 nite. 
 
 The chemists tell us that a high grade of muriate of 
 potash contains about 80 per cent of muriate of potash, 
 which is equal to 50 per cent of potassium oxide, or pure 
 potash. A high grade of sulphate contains about 52 per 
 cent of sulphate of potash, which is equal to about 28 per 
 cent of pure potash, and 30 per cent of sulphate of mag- 
 nesia, which is equal to 10 per cent of magnesium oxide. 
 A high grade kainite contains about 30 per cent of sul- 
 phate of potash (equal to about 14J per cent pure 
 potash), 35 per cent of chloride of sodium (which is but 
 another name for common salt), and 10 per cent of sul- 
 phate of magnesia. It generally has also some chloride 
 of magnesia. 
 
 In buying these fertilizers, we farmers are apt to think ' 
 we are getting more potash than they really contain. For 
 instance, 80 per cent of muriate of potash is apt to be 
 taken as meaning 80 per cent of potash, whereas it means 
 80 per cent of potassium combined with chlorine. The 
 quantity of potassium in the 80 per cent of pure muriate 
 would make 50 per cent of the weight of what we buy in 
 pure potash : and so on of each of them. Of wood ashes, 
 we are told that a certain quantity contains 5 per cent of 
 carbonate of potash. Now, carbonate of potash is not 
 pure potash, but a combination of carbonic acid (a com- 
 pound of carbon and oxygen) and potash ; about two 
 parts of the five being carbonic acid, leaving but three 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 19 
 
 parts pure potash. The cost of the potash in these combi- 
 nations varies somewhat from year to year, but, at their 
 lowest figure thus far, may be set down at seven cents per 
 pound for the potash in the combination of sulphate, and 
 three and three-quarters to four and one-half in muriate and 
 kainite. One reason why the sulphate bears a higher price 
 is, because it is sold as a purer article, costing more to pro- 
 duce, being especially freer from salt than either of the 
 others. 
 
 It has been found in reality, however, that much of 
 the so-called sulphate is really mostly muriate. Both the 
 muriate and kainite forms have salt in their composition, 
 which is considered injurious in its effect on some crops, 
 especially tobacco and potatoes ; affecting the quality of 
 the leaf in the former, and, by decreasing the proportion of 
 starch, tending to make potatoes watery. Because of the 
 heavy per cent of salt, I have found it dangerous to apply 
 kainite in the hill where small seed, such as cabbage, are to 
 be planted : it is better to apply it around the plants just 
 before their second hoeing. There is also the objection to 
 kainite, that it sometimes comes not purified from the chlo- 
 ride of magnesia, which is considered by agricultural 
 chemists to be generally injurious to vegetation. Those 
 forms of the salt containing sulphate of magnesia help 
 diffuse the potash throughout the soil, carrying in down ; 
 and hence such potash compounds (muriate oftentimes, 
 and kainite generally) having it in their combinations are 
 especially recommended for use when growing deep-rooting 
 crops, such as clover, beets, etc. This combination has 
 also another valuable characteristic, — its great power to 
 absorb or “ fix ” ammonia, and so preventing its escape, 
 being in this respect far superior to plaster. 
 
 It also has a rare and remarkable power of gathering 
 nitrogen from the air. A chemist experimented on several 
 
20 
 
 FERTILIZERS. 
 
 heaps of barn dung which were kept for a year. In one of 
 these, to which had been added 0.5 per cent of carbonate 
 of lime, there was a loss of 9.78 per cent of the nitrogen. 
 Where 1 per cent of plaster had been mixed with a heap, 
 there was a loss of but 0.84 per cent ; where 1 per cent 
 of sulphate of magnesia had been mixed, the heap was en- 
 riched with 5.06 percent of nitrogen; while 1 per cent of 
 kainite added 7.97 per cent, which must have come from, 
 the air . For such reason as this, kainite becomes very val- 
 uable to sprinkle in stables, or mix in manure heaps to 
 both fix and absorb ammonia. That word, “ fix,” ammonia 
 will bear a bit of defining ; and I will stop right here and 
 define it, because it will be likely to be used again before 
 we get through with our treatise. Ammonia in animal 
 manure, especially the liquids, is more or less in the form 
 of carbonate of ammonia. In this form it is volatile, and, 
 escaping into the air, is lost. It is this that makes us sneeze 
 when working over manure heaps. When in the form of 
 a sulphate (i.e., sulphate of ammonia), though it can be dis- 
 solved in water, yet it is not volatile. Now, sulphuric acid 
 likes ammonia better than it likes magnesia, while carbonic 
 acid likes magnesia better than it does ammonia : therefore, 
 when sulphate of magnesia and carbonate of ammonia are 
 brought near each other, there is a mutual divorce and a 
 remarriage all around ; and, the new unions being more 
 stable if not sedate, we have the non-volatile sulphate of 
 ammonia and the carbonate of magnesia. 
 
 There remains yet another hearty good word to speak 
 for kainite. Says Professor Dabney, “ Lime promotes the 
 action of kainite to a very marked degree ; kainite is, by 
 itself, frequently a proper application to swamp-lands and 
 new lands, being also a powerful digestive agent.” The 
 action of kainite may be either a direct one, supplying pot- 
 ash where potash is needed, or an indirect one, through the 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 21 
 
 agency of the secondary salts present, such as common 
 salt and sulphate of magnesia. These salts may promote 
 the solution of all the plant-nourishing material in the soil ; 
 hence the favorable action of kainite upon swamp-lands , newly 
 cleared land , and all lands abounding in vegetable matter . 
 They also benefit sandy soils by keeping them more moist. 
 German agricultural writers advise to apply kainite in 
 fall or winter, or the year previous, that the chlorides 
 may be diluted and washed down, and so be made harm- 
 less. They believe it is to be the foundation-rock of all 
 improvement on swamp-lands, as it has already brought 
 great blessings to the poor dwellers among the bogs and 
 moors of North Germany. 
 
 While plaster dissolves in four hundred and sixty times 
 its weight of water, kainite dissolves in one and three- 
 fourths its weight. Some fear is felt by our agricultural 
 chemists that farmers are using too much of these varieties 
 of potash having so large a per cent of salt in their com- 
 position. There may be ground for this in its application 
 to some crops. Five hundred pounds of kainite per acre 
 would carry with it less than three bushels of salt, which, 
 repeated for a series of years, might in the end prove hurt- 
 ful to some of our crops : but much of this would pass off 
 in the drainage of the soil ; while I have, by mistake, had 
 as high as thirty bushels applied to an acre of onions in 
 one year, with certainly no detriment to the crop. 
 
 In his report for 1882, Professor Dabney of the North 
 Carolina agricultural experiment station devotes twenty- 
 two pages to kainite and its uses. u Kainite,” he says, “ is 
 now an established specific against rust in cotton, and is 
 undoubtedly of great value, in connection with phosphate 
 and pease, as an improver of the soil.” It appears that 
 about all brought into Carolina is in the crude state, just 
 as mined, costing five dollars per 2,240 pounds aff Stass- 
 furt, and having an average composition of 
 
22 
 
 FERTILIZERS. 
 
 Sulphate of potash 23.38 
 
 Sulphate of magnesia 16.76 
 
 Chloride of magnesia 13.59 
 
 Common salt ........ 32.11 
 
 Moisture 13.40 
 
 Insoluble matter . . . . . . . .73 
 
 There is as much sulphuric acid in kainite as in sul- 
 phate of lime, which is but another name for plaster or 
 gypsum, all three being names of the same mineral. In 
 some instances kainite has given better results on re- 
 claimed meadows than muriate or sulphate of potash. On 
 sandy soil, in Germany, five hundred to eight hundred 
 pounds of kainite, with marl or lime, produced excellent 
 crops of pease for fodder, and gave, without additional 
 manure, a fine after-crop of grain or potatoes. In the 
 South the good effects of kainite has been much more 
 marked in dry seasons. Manuring with kainite only is 
 not wise ; for the salts composing kainite are powerful 
 digestive agents, and, though producing good crops as 
 long as the soil contains any plant-food to be dissolved, 
 may utterly fail afterwards, leaving the soil in far worse 
 condition than at first. 
 
 Kainite applied to meadows or grass appeared to check 
 the growth of the rougher grasses : it did best in combina- 
 tion with superphosphates and ammonia. It is the general 
 opinion of leading agriculturists , that all the varieties of Ger- 
 man potash do letter if applied in the fall ; and particularly 
 is this true of those having soda or magnesia in their com- 
 position^ as do all varieties of kainite and most of the 
 muriates. Potatoes have done well when kainite has been 
 applied the fall previous, but have at times been injured 
 by the application of it at the time of planting. That the 
 mischief done is mostly or wholly due to the presence of 
 salt in* the kainite, is shown by the effect of any manure 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 23 
 
 abounding in salt. A neighbor, some years ago, used a 
 large quantity of salt-marsh mud on his potatoes. The 
 result was a fine crop of remarkably smooth potatoes : 
 but he could not sell a second lot to the same customer ; 
 they were so watery as to be utterly useless for table use. 
 Kainite, with lime or superphosphate, appears to be a 
 special manure for pease and beans. On boggy land, where 
 nitrogenous manures injured the crops, kainite was a suc- 
 cess, surpassing even the richer potash salts. 
 
 WOOD ASHES. 
 
 Wood ashes are our great home source for potash. 
 These are brought into the market from several sources, 
 — the product of the brick-kiln, lime-kiln, or from the 
 woods of Canada or the far West. “Wood ashes,” says 
 Professor Goessmann, “have an agricultural value much 
 above their chemical value.” The principal reason of this 
 is, that they contain, not only potash, but all the elements 
 of plant-food except nitrogen, and these in just the same 
 proportions as they exist in nature, with the additional 
 advantage of having them in a very fine state of subdi- 
 vision. The main source of supply for the Eastern States 
 has been, of late years, those brought from Canada ; single 
 firms selling several hundreds of thousands of bushels 
 annually. The wood of different trees differs, not only in 
 the proportion of potash, lime, and phosphoric acid in 
 their ashes, but also in the quantity of their ashes in 
 equal quantities by measure of wood. Professor Johnson 
 gives the following analysis of birch, hickory, oak, and 
 chestnut wood. In the last two columns is the Analysis, 
 by Professor Storer, of thirteen samples of unleached Can- 
 ada ashes, and also thirteen samples taken from household 
 fires : — 
 
24 
 
 FERTILIZERS. 
 
 
 Hickory. 
 
 Birch. 
 
 Oak. 
 
 Chest- 
 
 nut. 
 
 Storer, 
 
 13 
 
 Samples 
 
 House- 
 
 hold 
 
 Ashes. 
 
 Storer, 
 
 13 
 
 Samples 
 
 Canada 
 
 Ashes. 
 
 Potash 
 
 7.54 
 
 8.15 
 
 9.26 
 
 3.96 
 
 8.50 
 
 5.77 
 
 Phosphoric acid . . . 
 
 2.19 
 
 2.30 
 
 1.92 
 
 1.69 
 
 2.04 
 
 1.17 
 
 Magnesia 
 
 Percentage of ash in the 
 
 6.51 
 
 4.36 
 
 4.28 
 
 5.82 
 
 - 
 
 - 
 
 wood 
 
 2.01 
 
 2.27 
 
 1.04 
 
 0.50 
 
 
 - 
 
 The birch was the common gray or pasture birch, which, 
 it will be perceived, yielded more ashes than any of the 
 others, — more than double that of the oak; while, with 
 the exception of the oak, it was the richest in potash, and 
 in phosphoric acid excelled either of the four. It is sur- 
 mised that the sample of chestnut may have been excep- 
 tionally poor in potash. I have been often told by those 
 who offered me the Canada ashes for sale, that, being 
 made from primitive wood, it was richer in potash than 
 our secondary growth. Let that fact be as it may, the 
 analysis by Professor Storer shows that the average of 
 the Canada ashes sold in New England are worth but 
 about five-eighths as much as the home product ; that is, 
 taking the potash and phosphoric acid as the measure of 
 value, where the home-made ashes is worth thirty-two 
 cents a bushel, the Canada would be worth but twenty 
 cents. Says Professor Johnson, u As a cord of hickory 
 wood weighs, on an average, about 3,500 pounds, a cord 
 of oak from 2,300 to 2,400 pounds, from the above figures 
 we find that the amounts of potash and phosphoric acid 
 recoverable in the ashes of a cord of oak and of hickory 
 are found to be as follows : — 
 
AGRFC ULTURAL 
 experiment station 
 
 FERTILIZERS.-' 1 N 23 1888 25 
 
 TKRSIT> 
 
 Potash 2.3 
 
 Phosphoric Acid . . . . .5 lb. 1.3 “ 
 
 The ashes made from burning the wood of deciduous or 
 hard-wood trees (those which shed their leaves in the fall) 
 are nearly as strong again in potash as those made from 
 trees of the evergreen class. Peat ashes are about one- 
 sixth as strong as the ashes of hard-wood trees ; those from 
 the burning of bituminous coal, one-twentieth as strong ; 
 while those from anthracite are but one-sixtieth as rich. 
 The deciduous trees differ considerably among themselves 
 in the per cent of potash found in their ashes ; the poplar, 
 apple, elm, oak, and birch taking a high rank. Though the 
 phosphoric acid in ashes is in an insoluble condition, yet 
 it is so finely subdivided that it readily becomes soluble 
 through the action of the carbonic acid present in the soil. 
 
 Ashes are sold, delivered at any railroad station, at 
 prices varying with the distance and the dealer. The 
 price per bushel, by the car-load of about six hundred 
 bushels, delivered in Eastern Massachusetts, is from 26 
 to 34 cents for unleached, and about 16 cents for leached. 
 Several parties supply the market, each of whom has a 
 word of criticism for his fellow-dealers : u He has coal 
 ashes, more or less, in what he sells.” “ He picks his up 
 through agents, and knows not what he gets.” “ He sells 
 more or less leached ashes for unleached.” I have bought 
 several car-loads of Messrs. Munroe & Stroup of Oswego, 
 N.Y., and believe that they have generally been of good 
 quality. More or less of them are of a suspiciously light 
 color : but I am informed that is the natural color of the 
 ashes from elm-trees, which abound in lime ; and, as the 
 ashes taste very strong of potash, 1 am inclined to be- 
 lieve it. The Canadians hold, that, for upland soils, the 
 ashes made from the “ black ” oak are nearly worthless. 
 
26 
 
 FERTILIZERS. 
 
 Trees vary greatly in the richness of their ashes in potash, 
 some being over twice as rich as others. For this reason, 
 and the additional variation possible through fraud, all 
 ashes ought to be bought and sold on analysis. It is true, 
 a man may make a pretty near guess by tasting or by 
 leaching a sample; but the test of a chemist, though a 
 fool, can far surpass the best guess of the most experi- 
 enced man. The result in the one case is a certainty; in 
 the other, at the best but an uncertainty. In dealing with 
 some of the smooth-tongued fellows who have all the way 
 to Canada between you and their facts, it is much easier to 
 analyze the ashes than the man. Ashes have been sold as 
 Canada unleached that proved, on analysis, to be nothing 
 more than oyster-shell lime having a slight admixture of 
 wood ashes. Leached ashes contain, on an average, about 
 1.40 per cent of potash, and 1.24 of phosphoric acid. 
 
 Let us not forget, what has been already stated, that 
 the potash in ashes is not pure. It is a carbonate, being 
 about three-fifths pure potash ; that is, five pounds of car- 
 bonate of potash are equal to three pounds of pure potash. 
 As to the value of ashes per bushel, if we allow 8 cents 
 per pound value for the potash, and 10 cents for the phos- 
 phoric acid, then Ave have, for Canada ashes, 5.77 X 8 = 
 46.16 + 1.17 X 10 — 11.70, equals 57.86 cents for the pot- 
 ash and phosphoric acid present in 100 pounds : we have 
 about 58 cents in value. If to this we add, for the lime, 
 soda, and magnesia, 8 cents, we have 66 cents as the com- 
 mercial value of 100 pounds of unleached Canada ashes; 
 and, as a bushel weighs about 45 pounds, its value would 
 be nearly 80 cents. 
 
 The peculiar proportion and fine condition in which the 
 several ingredients enter into ashes, make the agricultural 
 value considerably higher than this. The value of leached 
 ashes may be figured on the same basis ; all the ingredients 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 27 
 
 except the potash remaining about the same, while the 
 percentage of lime has been increased. 
 
 These facts seem to explain why leached ashes are 
 sometimes as valuable to the farmers as unleached. Such 
 cases simply prove that it was not potash the crop needed 
 so much as the lime or other ingredients which exist in 
 the leached about equally as strong as in the unleached. 
 In two experiments, tried two years in succession, on corn, 
 the leached, value for value, proved to be worth more 
 than the unleached. In giving value for value, more 
 magnesia, lime, and soda were applied with the leached 
 than with the unleached ; and in these, rather than pot- 
 ash, the soil was probably deficient. Or, the better results 
 may have been caused by the action of the lime and mag- 
 nesia in their releasing elements in the soil, thus making 
 its nitrogen available ; or by their improving its texture. 
 
 Professor Ville says, that though chloride of potassium, 
 sulphate of potassa, and the carbonate are all three soluble 
 in water, and all three are absorbed by the roots of plants, 
 yet chloride of potassium is inactive, the sulphate of po- 
 tassa nearly so, while the carbonate gives the best results. 
 If this is so, then it seems to follow, that potash in ashes 
 is worth more for agricultural use than in the form in 
 which much of it is found in the potash salts of Germany. 
 
 Logwood Ashes. — These are made from the wood or 
 wood sawdust after the coloring-matter has been ex- 
 tracted. They contain but a trace of potash (.08), with 
 2.30 of phosphoric acid. I have had them offered at ten 
 cents per bushel. Obviously all their value comes from 
 their phosphoric acid. 
 
 Rotten Wood. — As bones exposed a while on the sur- 
 face, part with their nitrogen to the greedy soil ; so wood 
 exposed so long as to be pretty rotten, appears to part with 
 its potash, for I am told that little or none is found in its 
 
28 
 
 FERTILIZERS . 
 
 ashes. Probably this is one of the reasons why the soil 
 from chip-waste is so good a fertilizer. 
 
 Tan Ash. — This is a very light ash, and is considered 
 by soap-makers as very poor in potash ; the lye from it 
 being “ about equal in strength to pump-water,” as one told 
 me. Nevertheless, there is value in it, especially on low 
 grass-land, probably from the lime, magnesia, etc., in its 
 composition. It sells for a low figure, less than half the 
 price of ordinary ashes. 
 
 Brick-Kiln Ashes. — These always come mixed more 
 or less with broken brick and burnt clay, and are worth no 
 more than the ashes made from the wood used in burning 
 the brick. The mass is worth from five to seventeen cents 
 per bushel. 
 
 Lime-Kiln Ashes. — These are usually a little wood 
 ashes mixed with five or six times their weight of particles 
 of lime partly burnt. Some analyze of less value than air- 
 slacked lime. A few years ago I examined a sample from 
 some thousands of bushels offered me at sixteen cents per 
 bushel : a common sieve took out over half its weight of 
 worthless limestone, leaving the remainder largely made 
 up of smaller particles of the same. The lot would have 
 been dear at eight cents per bushel. 
 
 Ashes from bushes, bark of trees, and animals, are richer 
 in potash than those from the body wood ; and those from 
 cultivated trees are said to be richer than those made from 
 trees of wild growth. 
 
 Burnt Soil. — Where stumps, bushes, and sods are 
 burned, there is left a mass of red-colored, light, ash-like resi- 
 due. This, farmers usually call ashes. Bear in mind our 
 axiom, that, in manure matters, nothing more can come out 
 than goes in. The real ashes, therefore, in such heaps, must 
 bear the usual proportion to the vegetable matter burned. 
 By this measure to guide us, we must conclude that but a 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 29 
 
 very insignificant proportion of the ash-looking mass is 
 ashes from burnt vegetable matter. And such is the fact : 
 the great bulk of it is simple mineral matter from burnt 
 soil, colored red by the action of the fire on the iron that is 
 found in about all soils, — the. same mineral that makes the 
 white brick turn red in burning. 
 
 COAL ASHES. 
 
 Coal ashes contain no appreciable amount of potash : 
 the chief ingredient is silica. They contain also some 
 lime and magnesia : some assert that there is as high as 
 100 pounds of magnesia to the cord, with 160 pounds of 
 sulphuric acid. The trace of potash comes from the wood 
 used in kindling fires, and the coal itself. Theoretically, 
 coal ashes should prove of but little value on most soils, 
 beyond making heavy soils more open, and supplying silica 
 to land of a muck-like character ; still, there is considerable 
 of value in them, when used in connection with manure, 
 on some crops, especially potatoes, and around bushes and 
 fruit-trees. Here they serve as a mulch, and, like all 
 mulches, indirectly improve the soil beneath them. Many 
 of the coal ash-heaps in towns are made receptacles for the 
 slops of the family, which turn them into manure that will 
 pay for carting a mile or two. When night-soil is col- 
 lected, they are valuable for forming the bed to receive it, 
 acting as an excellent absorbent. 
 
 COTTON-SEED HULLS. 
 
 This is one of the sources for potash confined mostly to 
 the South, not only because they are wholly burned there, 
 but because the ashes are oftentimes mixed more or less 
 with coal ashes, and charred and unburnt hulls used in the 
 furnaces of the oil manufactories, where they are largely 
 consumed as fuel. Because of these impurities, they are 
 
30 
 
 FERTILIZERS. 
 
 rarely found in the market for sale. The ashes analyze, 
 on an average, 19.5 potash, and 9.2 phosphoric acid ; nearly 
 all of each in a soluble condition. They are usually sold at 
 twelve dollars per ton, while the potash alone makes them 
 worth nearly twice as much. The strong potash attracts 
 moisture, of which there is usually 15 per cent present. 
 
 THE NEED AND USES OF POTASH IN AGRICULTURE. 
 
 Potash, as we have already stated, is one of the three 
 essentials for plant-growth. By this I do not mean to 
 advise that it should always be applied to every crop ; for 
 there are soils already so over-rich in potash and soda, that, 
 except the wild sage and a few other shrubs, nothing will 
 grow on them. This is the characteristic of what was 
 known in our geographies as “ the great American 
 desert.” The trouble was, it was over-rich in soda ; but, 
 when the Mormons at Utah diluted these with water from 
 the mountains, the “ desert ” disappeared, and in its place 
 stands a fertile land. Some of the soils of New Eng- 
 land, even, will bear cropping for a few years without any 
 application of potash : they may have good natural stores 
 of it in plant-food form, or the potash may have accumu- 
 lated in the soil through years of heavy manuring. The 
 natural growth on any soil is a good indication as to 
 whether or not our farms are rich in potash. If they yield 
 a thrifty growth of potash-bearing trees or plants, such as 
 beech, maple, oak, walnut, or elm among trees, or tansy or 
 purslane among plants, it is a fair inference that it is nat- 
 urally rich in potash in food condition. Soils that have 
 been manured for years with either barn manures or sea 
 manures, have large stores of accumulated potash ; and, 
 when using commercial fertilizers on such soils, this fact 
 might economically be borne in mind. As has been shown 
 before, about all soils derived from granitic rock are enor- 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 31 
 
 mously rich in potash in a latent state. Soils formed from 
 red sandstone contain potash (usually) enough to make 
 the application to some crops unnecessary. 
 
 It may be objected, to the above position, that the trees 
 and plants, having taken the quantity necessary for their 
 structure out of the ground, would leave it poor in potash. 
 In reply, I would say that the natural potash supply is 
 practically inexhaustible : the thrift of the trees indicates 
 that it is supplied as fast as plant-growth can take it up, 
 which is another way of stating that it is rich in available 
 potash. Clover and beans are very sensitive to a defi- 
 ciency of potash in the soil ; and if we farmers wish to 
 inquire of our land as to whether it needs potash in the 
 fertilizers we apply, if we plant either of these, we shall 
 get an answer. Kemp’s manure-spreader is an excellent 
 means for spreading ashes, though one would not be likely 
 to think so on looking at it ; yet it is really as good for dis- 
 tributing ashes as it is manure. When filled with manure, 
 it distributes at the rate of four cords to the acre. Four 
 cords are 400 bushels. Now, then, if w T e wish to spread 
 any given quantity of ashes per acre, we must fill the body 
 just that proportion full as the quantity we desire to use 
 on an acre is of 400. For instance, if we wanted to spread 
 100 bushels to the acre, then we must fill it one-quarter 
 full ; for, if entirely full, it would spread 400. And just 
 here let me repeat, that neither potash nor phosphoric acid 
 wastes to any extent in the soil ; that is, they always re- 
 main within the reach of the roots of plants : and therefore 
 any surplus left over from one crop will be found by after- 
 crops. 
 
 If farmers will get into the habit of testing their soils 
 (we shall illustrate this farther on), they might at times 
 omit the use of potash on their crops with no loss. But it 
 would not be wise to risk this : we should know what we 
 
32 
 
 FERTILIZERS. 
 
 are doing. “ The result of a study of a long list of experi- 
 ments,” says the “ Connecticut Agricultural Report ” of 
 1880, “is to prove clearly that in many instances the 
 reason why guano, fish, bone, superphosphate, and other 
 manures fail to give a satisfactory result is, for want of 
 potash.” In cases where fish or night-soil has been used 
 exclusively as fertilizers for a series of years, the soil some- 
 times bakes, and becomes nearly sterile ; the application 
 of potash to such soils is often followed by very strik- 
 ing results. On land where potash did no good applied 
 to corn, it did prove valuable to potatoes alongside : “ and, 
 if it does good under such circumstances, it might be 
 assumed to do good to potatoes on any soil; and such is 
 the fact.” On some soils the effect of potash is very strik- 
 ing. On the farm of Mr. Sage, one of the enterprising 
 experimenters with chemicals, potash paid him ten times 
 its cost on corn, potatoes, oats, and wheat. A good deal 
 more enterprise along the line of these soil-tests would 
 pay all of us brother farmers a heavier per cent than we 
 ever received from any savings bank. The effect of all 
 forms of potash is decidedly greater if applied in the fall 
 or winter. The sulphate and muriate may be mixed with 
 any fertilizer, as they will not free the ammonia. Un- 
 leached ashes, the agricultural chemists tell us, can be 
 safely mixed with guano, flesh, blood, castor-pomace, 
 cotton-seed meal, and with stable manure (if it is not in 
 a fermenting condition), if in each instance a little soil is 
 thrown over the mass, or they are ploughed under soon after 
 mixing. If the ashes are first treated with sulphuric acid, 
 so as to change the carbonate of potash they contain, which 
 is volatile, into a sulphate which is not volatile, it may 
 then be used like the German potash salts, and be freely 
 mixed with any manure, under any circumstances. Guano, 
 given in the above list, I should take exception to ; for, 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 83 
 
 if either that or the ashes are damp, in my experience 
 I found a loss of ammonia immediately perceptible. If 
 mixed with a mixture of fish and barn manure, it will 
 hasten decomposition; but the mass should be covered 
 with soil, to catch the ammonia. 
 
 Mr. Lawes, after his famous experiments in England, 
 extending over a period of forty years, concludes that in 
 his soil, which is a strong clay, potash is found naturally 
 in sufficient quantity, and therefore no artificial supply is 
 required. In this country, the application of potash usually 
 has a good effect on clay soils ; though, as potash enters 
 largely into their composition, one would naturally infer 
 the contrary. The benefits from it are thought to be due 
 to its indirect action in opening the soil or otherwise im- 
 proving its mechanical condition, and also by rendering 
 other plant-food available. In the valuable experiments 
 inaugurated by the Connecticut commissioner of agricul- 
 ture, it was found that potash helped the crop most on 
 the poorer soils, while it did but little good on those that 
 were rich. Professor Ville recommends potash especially 
 for pease, beans, clover, lucern, flax, and potatoes. Out of 
 twenty-six experiments in corn-raising, it was noted by 
 Professor Atwater, that of the three elements, viz., 
 nitrogen, phosphoric acid, and potash, the latter did most 
 good in five of them, proved useful in six, and in the 
 remaining fifteen did no good. In the experiments at 
 the Agricultural College of Maine, beans were decidedly 
 benefited by the application of potash, while ruta-bagas 
 were not helped. It has been found, that, when muriate 
 of potash and nitrate of soda are mixed together, and 
 applied as a fertilizer, in dry seasons they did more harm 
 than good. It is found that plants have the power of 
 substituting potash for soda, but the reverse does not 
 always hold true. 
 
34 
 
 FERTILIZERS. 
 
 WHAT IS NITROGEN? 
 
 The air mass which surrounds the earth for a depth of 
 about fifty miles, as it flashes through space more than 
 twenty times swifter than a cannon-ball at the highest 
 velocity, is made up of about four-fifths nitrogen and one- 
 fifth oxygen gas. This gives unnumbered thousands of 
 tons of nitrogen always right at hand, but never avail- 
 able ; for human knowledge has not as jet discovered a 
 way by which nitrogen can be economically got at for 
 plant-food. We have to depend, for our supply, wholly on 
 what plants and animals have incorporated into their 
 structure ; using their waste in the form of manure and 
 dead remains, either from land or sea, for our source of sup- 
 ply. The ammoniated liquor from the gas-works is but the 
 waste produced from the remains of ancient forests, which 
 we burn as coal. The same is true of animal life as of plant 
 life. Though over three-fourths of the air we breathe is 
 nitrogen, and it enters so largely into the composition of 
 our bodies, yet we have to obtain it from the animal 
 and vegetable food we eat. As the product of animal 
 waste in drinking-water, it sometimes causes dangerous 
 fevers. When nitrogen is combined with hydrogen, — 18 
 parts of hydrogen to 82 parts of nitrogen, — we have am- 
 monia, one of the most common forms in which, from the 
 waste of both animals and plants, nitrogen is fed to our 
 crops. 
 
 The other most important source of nitrogen is nitric 
 acid. This is a combination of nitrogen with oxygen ; 
 and nitrates, of which we see frequent mention in all 
 works on manures, are a combination of the nitric acid 
 with soda, potash, and other materials, which are called 
 bases. It is well to fix in the mind, that, in changing 
 nitrogen to ammonia in any manure analysis, we must add 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 35 
 
 about one-fifth to the quantity given. It appears to be 
 the settled conviction among men of science, as the results 
 from many experiments, that plants cannot take up pure 
 nitrogen directly from the air. The theory is, that they 
 are able, to a greater or less degree, to get their supply 
 through the water, that carries it in some form in solution 
 into the soil, and also from the air indirectly, by the soil 
 first separating it from the air that permeates it. Still 
 another source of natural supply for plant-growth is nitro- 
 gen in a latent condition, that has accumulated in the soil, 
 set free by the action of such substances as lime and 
 plaster. There is a general belief among agriculturists, 
 that plants have ways of collecting nitrogen still but little 
 known ; while some extremists have gone so far as to de- 
 clare that there is no necessity of feeding nitrogen to our 
 crops, for they can of themselves collect from natural 
 sources all they require. There is a growing belief that 
 their power to supply their wants from natural sources 
 is greater than has hitherto been credited to them. It is 
 found, also, that different kinds of plants have different 
 capacities for taking up nitrogen. Clover is an example ; 
 for, though nitrogen enters largely into its composition, it 
 has such a capacity to help itself to the good things which 
 surround it, that it needs but very little artificial help 
 from the manure pile : while wheat, though it needs but 
 little nitrogen, is so dainty a feeder that it insists on a 
 large artificial supply, from which it may pick out that little. 
 
 WHERE NITROGEN OR AMMONIA COMES FROM. 
 
 The Waste of the Fisheries. — One of the prin- 
 cipal sources from which manufacturers obtain the am- 
 monia in their fertilizers is from the fish waste or offal 
 which they pick up all along the Atlantic coast, from 
 Maine to Florida. The largest portion of the waste is 
 
36 
 
 FERTILIZERS. 
 
 from the fish known by various names in different locali- 
 ties, as “manhaden,” “ heart-heads,” “ moss-bunkers,” and, 
 in the South, as “ fat-backs.” These are caught in nets, 
 and boiled, to secure the oil, in which they are rich, at 
 various establishments along the shore and islands of the 
 coast. After boiling, the water and oil are pressed out of 
 the mass, and the residue sometimes thrown into heaps, 
 to heat and dry ; at other times it is put directly into bar- 
 rels, and pressed in. In this condition it is known as 
 u pomace ” or “ chum.” If it is to be sold as fish-guano, it 
 is spread on large platforms to dry, after which it is ground. 
 
 As a general rule, three barrels of fish before cooking 
 make one barrel of the chum. The fertilizer manufac- 
 turer dries and grinds it, using it crude, or treating it with 
 acid, to make the nitrogen and phosphoric acid directly 
 available for plant-food. Sometimes, when the catch is a 
 large one (over two hundred thousand fishes are at times 
 taken in a single haul of the net, enough to load two or 
 three vessels of fifty tons each), and the quantity of fish 
 is larger than the oil-factories can take care of in hot 
 weather, the surplus is sold to the neighboring farmers at 
 the best price that can be got. These fish are oftentimes 
 put directly on the grass-land. The effect is very stimu- 
 lating, and enormous crops of grass can be raised for a 
 few years by such annual dressings ; but the final result, 
 especially on light soils, is, the fish have less and less effect, 
 and the crop is almost nothing. The soil is dying for 
 want of potash, in which element fish-waste is deficient. 
 To recuperate it, apply potash, or manures rich in potash, 
 and its fertility will be restored. Soils abounding in clay 
 will stand fish-manuring without showing injury longer 
 than those of a gravelly character. 
 
 Besides the manhaden, there are numerous other fish- 
 wastes, all rich in nitrogen and phosphate. On two occa- 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 37 
 
 sions I have purchased cargoes of spoiled herring ; in one 
 instance, nine hundred barrels, at the rate of fifty or sixty 
 cents a barrel, which, as a barrel weighs about two hun- 
 dred pounds, would be about five dollars per ton. In some 
 instances the fish are preserved in salt, which adds one- 
 quarter or more to the weight : in others they are fresh, 
 with the oil in them, which does not add to their value as 
 manure, for oil is nearly pure carbon, which is of no value 
 for that purpose ; on the contrary, it hinders, somewhat, 
 their decomposition. Occasionally, during the fall fishing 
 on the fishing-banks near the coast, a supply of pollock 
 will accumulate more than the market can take, when 
 they can be purchased at a price that will make cheap 
 manure. A few years ago, to help sustain the market, I 
 left a standing offer with our fisherman that I would pay 
 twenty-five cents a hundred pounds for pollock : the 
 result was twenty thousand pounds of fine large fish, 
 weighing from eight to fifteen pounds, just out of the 
 water, hauled to my manure heaps. A few years ago vast 
 quantities of waste were made in the heads, sound-bones, 
 and entrails which accumulate at fishing-ports. These 
 were for years dropped into the ocean as refuse. So 
 immense was the waste, that at the Isle of Shoals, off 
 the New-Hampshire shore, the harbors actually became so 
 nearly closed to navigation that the inhabitants on two 
 occasions had to dredge them out. I am told, that, be- 
 neath some of the long wharves of Gloucester, the great 
 fishing-town of the United States, there has accumu- 
 lated an almost immeasurable quantity of this bone refuse. 
 When, a few years ago, the heads, sound-bones, and en- 
 trails became a market article, I used to buy it at five or 
 six dollars a cord on board the cars: a cord weighs from 
 three and a half to four tons. It was exceedingly cheap 
 manure, but a very disagreeable one to handle, the smell 
 
38 
 
 FERTILIZERS. 
 
 being any thing but ottar of roses, while it took a vast 
 quantity of soil to compost it. After remaining some 
 months, oftentimes the heads would not be fully decayed, 
 making the mass extremely disagreeable to handle ; while 
 there could be only a rough guess made as to how much 
 of it would become plant-food the same season it was 
 applied. Of late years the fish are for the most part 
 cleaned before the vessels reach port, and the waste 
 thrown overboard. At places along the coast where bay- 
 fishing is carried on on a large scale, there can be some- 
 times found a liver or blubber “ chum ; ” it being the refuse 
 after oil is extracted from fish-liver. If a year old, it 
 loses moisture and consequently weight, and is therefore 
 richer. This liver chum is a pasty, sticky substance, gen- 
 erally sold at a figure considerably below its value by 
 analysis. I have bought it as low as $4.50 per ton the 
 present season (1885) ; and it is rarely higher than $12, 
 though, by analysis, it is worth $18.83 per ton. I would 
 advise cutting liver refuse with sharp sand, to make it 
 fairly fine. 
 
 Halibut “ chum ” is the refuse from the heads of hali- 
 but, which are cooked under high pressure, to extract 
 the oil that exists in the bones. The result is, to leave the 
 bones in such a state that they can easily be crumbled. 
 Naturally, this is especially rich in phosphoric acid. It 
 analyzes worth $19.99 per ton, and is sold at from $6 
 to $10. This chum is usually engaged beforehand by 
 dealers in fertilizers ; but a wide-awake man, by looking 
 around, can generally pick up a supply. The waste of 
 herring and mackerel at the fishing-towns is sometimes 
 made up into “ chum,” being first boiled, to secure what- 
 ever oil they contain. These usually contain more or less 
 of salt, having sometimes as high as twenty per cent, 
 which makes them about as salt as kainite ; and, like the 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 39 
 
 potash-bearing mineral, they therefore need to be used 
 with some care, lest the proportion of salt present injure 
 the roots of growing plants. 
 
 There is another waste of the fisheries which has come 
 into the market of late years : I refer to the skins, bones, 
 and fins of salted fish. These come from the fish that 
 are stripped, and sold, boxed, free of bones. It is a heavy 
 article, and the strips come a little tangled. Fertilizer 
 manufacturers usually monopolize this ; though it can 
 sometimes be picked up at Gloucester, Mass., at from 
 $3.75 to $15 per ton. 
 
 Dog-fish, which is another name for a small species of shark, 
 in the summer season swarm along the New-England coast, 
 on the inner fishing-banks, driving away most other varie- 
 ties. They weigh from three to five pounds. They are 
 very easily caught, and, their muscles being very firm, are 
 rich as manure. The great trouble in manipulating these 
 has been because, the flesh being of a sticky and oily na- 
 ture, acid will not readily act on it. Still, they are used 
 very largely, as a source for ammonia, by one large fertil- 
 izer manufacturer in the vicinity of Boston, who composts 
 them with horse manure, and, I infer, lets his compost 
 heaps remain two years before using, when the objection 
 disappears. Being so abundant along the coast, and so 
 cheap, being sold, wholesale, at $1 a hundred fish, they 
 are well worthy the attention of farmers who live along 
 the shore ; for, though it might be necessary to keep them 
 over a year, the investment would pay an interest of some 
 hundred per cent. The fishermen in many localities would 
 catch them if there was a market for them. The oil from 
 the livers averages about a cent each fish ; and, with one 
 cent from the livers and another for the fish itself, quite a 
 fair business can be done during the hot months. 
 
 Waste salt that has been once used on fish contains in 
 
40 
 
 FERTILIZERS. 
 
 it some fish-waste, such as blood, and particles of the flesh 
 and scales of the fish ; for this reason, it has some value 
 as manure, in addition to its action on crops as salt. The 
 fish-scales analyze in the vicinity of sixteen per cent in 
 ammonia, and forty cents in phosphate of lime : they de- 
 compose more slowly than the flesh of the fish. Fish- 
 manure, having the same origin as Peruvian guano, has the 
 same constituents, but not in the same proportion ; for 
 ages of decay have reduced the guano greatly in bulk, and 
 in the same proportion have concentrated it. All forms 
 of “ chum ” have a large proportion of water in their com- 
 position. The fish-heads and back-bones have as high 
 as 66 per cent: the. chum pressed by a hand press has 
 about 50 per cent, and that from a hydraulic press about 
 40 per cent. The average of the whole fish, as taken 
 from the water, is about 80 per cent. The fish-guano 
 made from dried fish-waste, contains, on an average, 7.8 
 per cent of nitrogen. In making fish-guano, the waste is 
 dried in the sun or by waste steam, and, when sufficiently 
 dry, is ground, and sold at about $33 per ton. 
 
 The shells of lobsters, of which vast quantities accumu- 
 late at canning-factories, are ground up, and sold as plant- 
 food. They are a complete manure, and especially rich in 
 nitrogen : analyzing, nitrogen, 6.2; potash, 0.2 ; phosphoric 
 acid, 2.3. 
 
 HOW TO HANDLE FISH-WASTE, AND THE BEST WAY TO 
 FEED IT TO THE CROPS. 
 
 All fish-waste used in a crude state, as might be inferred 
 from its composition, is very stimulating, and, being pur- 
 chased at a low figure, is oftentimes used by farmers with 
 a very liberal hand. As a consequence, their crops are 
 sometimes “ burned up,” as the phrase is. They are apt 
 to infer, that, if they cannot see the presence of the fish in 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 41 
 
 any part of the soil of the compost heaps as they pitch it 
 over, such soil can have no richness. Now, one of the 
 wonderful properties of dry soil is the avidity with which 
 it takes ammonia to itself ; and it may always be safely 
 inferred, that, in a well-mixed compost heap of fish-waste, 
 the ammonia has diffused itself through every portion of 
 it ; and, all portions being assumed to be rich plant-food, it 
 should be used accordingly. Owing to the great richness 
 of manure made from fish in bulk, it is wiser, even after 
 composting it, to use it broadcast, rather than in the hill. 
 Fish “chum, ” or “pomace,” may be used either broadcast 
 and harrowed in, or by first composting with poor manure, 
 to enrich the same. If, after being broken up fine, it is 
 put in thin layers with the manure, it will help the devel- 
 opment of heat, which will tend to fine it up, so that it will 
 combine with the mass when it is pitched over. A third 
 way is, to compost it with soil, waste turf, muck, or saw- 
 dust. In either way it is composted, it is always good 
 farming to take careful notes of how many barrels go into 
 the heap, that from that we may know how much of pot- 
 ash, ammonia, and phosphoric acid we are applying to any 
 given crop, and govern ourselves accordingly. There are 
 two mistakes made in applying too heavily to one to 
 applying too sparingly. 
 
 It is surprising how penetrating is the ammonia from 
 fish-compost. For this reason, in making a heap, the bot- 
 tom layer of soil should be a foot or more in thickness. I 
 have seen cases, where the fish was mixed liberally, where 
 the soil was full of ammonia for several feet below the 
 surface. In making the compost heap, after spreading 
 the bottom layer, which should be thicker when whole fish 
 or the coarser waste is used, cover this with sufficient waste 
 to just hide the soil ; then cover wdth sod or soil about six 
 times the depth of the fish ; and thus proceed, scattering 
 
42 
 
 FERTILIZERS. 
 
 raw ground plaster over each layer of fish before covering 
 with soil, at the rate of fifty pounds of plaster to three 
 hundred weight of fish. After the pile has been built up 
 four or five feet in height, surround the entire heap (it 
 should be on level ground) with a little embankment of 
 fine soil. This will catch the liquid that often runs from 
 it when the fish begins to decompose, as well as catch what 
 may be soaked from it by heavy rains ; while it will also 
 be handy to fill up the holes that are apt to show them- 
 selves in the top as the decomposition progresses, letting 
 out bad odors unless they are promptly closed. As the 
 presence of oil or salt tends to check decomposition, fish- 
 waste containing much of either of these had better be 
 composted with stable manure rather than soil, as the heat 
 from the manure will start decomposition. If decomposi- 
 tion is slow to start, unleached ashes or lime and plaster 
 may be mixed with the mass ; but be sure to cover such 
 heaps with soil. The compost heaps, when manure is not 
 used, should be made, if possible, before warm weather 
 closes; and, should no heat be found by driving a bar 
 down, and testing it, after it has lain a couple of weeks, 
 then pitch it over, to let the air in, and cover the outside 
 lightly with soil. Where chum is used, after having been 
 made fine, it can be applied directly to the surface of till- 
 age land in the fall, and harrowed in, or be ploughed 
 lightly under, to be thrown up near the surface by a 
 deeper ploughing in the spring. If left on the surface, I 
 find it is spreading a table all winter long for the crows 
 of the country. 
 
 By apptying the chum in the fall, it will have the ad- 
 vantage of rain and frost to help subdivide and dissolve it. 
 Fish-skins, when used on tillage land, had better first be 
 composted. If to be used on sward-land for grass, spread 
 thin in the fall or very early spring. 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 43 
 
 HOW MUCH FISH- WASTE SHOULD BE USED TO THE ACRE ? 
 
 To determine this, we must consider two points. First, 
 what proportion of it will make digestible plant-food the 
 first season? and secondly, what and how much of the 
 phosphoric acid and ammonia found in them do the crops 
 we propose to raise require ? I think we can assume, as a 
 general truth, that about all the ammonia becomes plant- 
 food the same season it is applied, while not much over 
 one-half of the phosphoric acid can be safely counted on. 
 If we use fish-waste on the same land the second year, 
 we may assume that all the phosphoric acid is available ; 
 for by that time the half left over from last season will 
 have decomposed. 
 
 However, as this form of plant-food affords phosphoric 
 adid and nitrogen in a very cheap form, and as there is 
 usually some loss from the amount assigned to each acre, 
 by the depredation from dogs, and more especially from 
 crows, before it is ploughed or harrowed under, I would 
 advise, what I myself practise, rather a liberal application 
 of the fertilizer, whether it be in the form of chum or of 
 fish-skins. On good soil a fine crop of cabbage may be 
 raised, by first ploughing under a hundred bushels of un- 
 leached ashes to the acre, and, after having first run fur- 
 rows at the distance apart decided on for the rows of 
 cabbage, scattering over the surface two tons of fish-chum 
 that has been made fine and mixed with soil. Harrow the 
 land, -when naturally the furrows will get an extra share of 
 the fish, which will be a cheap way of manuring in the 
 hill. The seed either may be drilled in, or planted as 
 usual. 
 
44 
 
 FERTILIZERS. 
 
 OTHER SOURCES FOR NITROGEN. 
 
 Peruvian Guano , Sulphate of Ammonia , Nitrate of Potash , Nitrate of Soda , 
 
 Cast or- Pomace, Azotin , Ammonite , Tankage , Dried Blood , Cotton-Seed 
 
 Waste , Hoof and Horn Shavings , and Leather- Waste. 
 
 (An analysis of the above will be found in the table on pp. Ill, 112.) 
 
 As this treatise is to be for the most part confined to 
 those sources of crop-food, which, by way of contrast with 
 barnyard and the more common class of manures, are 
 called “ fertilizers,” I will not go into details relative to 
 several of the sources from which nitrogen may be obtained, 
 as this would make my treatise too extensive. If the public 
 should appear to desire a more extended work, containing 
 other manure resources, I may write it at a future day. 
 
 At the head of fertilizers, as distinguished from barn 
 manure, stands guano. This may be defined as rotten 
 sea-bird dung, with the remains of birds mixed with it. It 
 is found on thousands of islands, but only on a few of these 
 in large quantities. Being manure of birds that feed on 
 fish, it would always contain the same manure elements 
 as fish, but that the rain dissolves and washes out the 
 ammonia, leaving but the phosphate behind. Near Peru, 
 however, there are a few islands lying in a region where 
 no rain falls ; as what would otherwise be the rain-bearing 
 wind for the region loses all its moisture by the time it 
 passes over the high, dry tops of the lofty Andes Moun- 
 tains. These islands yield a guano rich in ammonia. 
 There are several kinds of guano in the market, known as 
 Rectified, Guaranteed, Standard, Lobos, Navassa, Carib- 
 bean, etc. The first three named are varieties of the 
 Peruvian (sometimes also called Chincha, or Guanape, to 
 designate the localities from which they were obtained), all 
 rich in ammonia, — Standard containing nine to ten per 
 cent, Lobos five to five and one-half, and Guaranteed six to 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 45 
 
 seven. Each is rich in phosphoric acid, nearly all soluble, 
 and has from two to three per cent of potash. The Navassa 
 and Caribbean-sea guanos are rich in insoluble phosphoric 
 acid, but are entirely wanting in nitrogen or potash. I 
 have usually purchased my guano of Seth Chapman’s Son 
 & Co., No. 170 Front Street, New-York City, who are the 
 sub-agents of the Peruvian Government for the North- 
 Eastern States. Their published analysis gives to the 
 Standard nine to ten per cent ammonia, twelve per cent 
 phosphoric acid, and three per cent potash. 
 
 It is claimed that the nitrogen in the guano has a value 
 over that contained in manure, into which enters fish 
 blood or meat as a supply of ammonia, and hence called 
 “organic nitrogen,” inasmuch as in the guano it is in a 
 form ready to be taken up by plants, while the fish blood 
 and meat must first enter into a state of putrefaction, 
 when some of the nitrogen is set free in a pure state, 
 and, being, in that condition, inert as plant-food, is partly 
 lost to the plant. This loss has been estimated to be from 
 one-sixth to one-third the total amount of nitrogen con- 
 tained in the substance. Be the reason what it may, no 
 one fertilizer has given such universal satisfaction as 
 guano. It, indeed, is the standard by which we almost 
 instinctively measure the value of all other fertilizers. It 
 having been asserted that about all the guano sold of 
 recent years was an artificial product, made from fish as a 
 base, with enough of real guano added to give the guano 
 color to the fertilizer, I wrote about the matter to Seth 
 Chapman’s Son & Co., who are the agents for the sale of 
 this fertilizer. In justice to them, I publish their reply : — 
 
 New York, Feb. 5, 1885. 
 
 Mr. J. J. H. Gregory, Marblehead, Mass. 
 
 Dear Sir, — Yours of the 4th inst. is received. We have heard more or 
 less about adulteration of Peruvian guano ever since Messrs. Hurtado & 
 Co. commenced making it of uniform quality by mixing cargoes of differ- 
 
46 
 
 FERTILIZERS. 
 
 ent analyses, some nine years ago ; but we have never been able to learn 
 that any thing was added to it other than sulphate of ammonia. This, 
 which is the same form of ammonia found in Peruvian guano, is used to 
 bring up the percentage to the standard when the guano is deficient. We 
 can supply the crude guano in sealed bags, as imported, and furnish a copy 
 of analysis, which is not guaranteed ; nor is any allowance made for stones. 
 Price, same as Standard, $63 for 2,240 pounds; and analyses said to be the 
 same. 
 
 Yours respectfully, 
 
 SETH CHAPMAN’S SON & CO. 
 
 From this we learn that it is still possible to obtain 
 guano in the original, unbroken packages, directly from 
 the guano islands, though it will be more or less lumpy, 
 and there may be some stones among it. Messrs. Chap- 
 man & Co. quote, Feb. 6, 1885, guano in original bags per 
 ton of 2,240 pounds, $63 ; Standard, $63 ; Lobos, $48. 
 This price is at their store, for which cartage to the cars 
 is $1.25 per ton. After paying freight, I have found 
 the price to be several dollars per ton cheaper than the 
 same quality of guano is sold at nearer home. Farmers, 
 in buying, should remember the difference in quality be- 
 tween Lobos and the Standard, and should see that the 
 price corresponds. I am told of an instance in Central 
 Massachusetts, where last season a party mixed a little 
 guano with salt-cake, as the residue of the manufacture 
 of sulphuric acid is called, and sold five hundred tons of 
 the stuff as a fertilizer. He was prosecuted, but, being a 
 lawyer himself, found some loophole in the law, through 
 which he crawled. 
 
 It is proper to state just here, that the fertilizers in the 
 market into whose name the word “ guano ” enters, how- 
 ever good they may be, have not now, as far as I can 
 learn, a particle of Peruvian guano in their composition. 
 I must also add, that dealers in fertilizers assert that the 
 amount of real Peruvian guano imported is but trivial 
 compared with the quantity sold under that name, and 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 47 
 
 that some of that imported into this country from England 
 has been found to be grossly adulterated. All that we 
 farmers can do is, to buy it under a warrant that it contains 
 given quantities of nitrogen, phosphoric acid, and potash. 
 Mr. Chapman says in his letter, that, in bringing the nitro- 
 gen up to that required for Standard, sulphate of am- 
 monia was used. Assuming this to be so, and that it is 
 not obtained from any organic source, then it would be of 
 the same value as though obtained from the guano itself. 
 From tests I made on grass-land, I found that the Peru- 
 vian guano I purchased of Messrs. Chapman & Co. started 
 the grass earlier than did an equal value of sulphate of 
 ammonia applied at the same time, side by side, on an 
 equal area. This satisfied me that its nitrogen was not 
 derived wholly, if at all, from waste fish or meat. 
 
 Ten years ago the New York Agricultural Society took 
 up the matter of the adulteration of Peruvian guano, 
 purchased eleven bags of as many dealers, and had them 
 analyzed. The result was a value differing from $38.33 to 
 $107.68, though each was sold at the same price per ton. 
 In the report of the Connecticut agricultural station for 
 1881, it is stated, that, while Peruvian guano used formerly 
 to contain no more than one or two per cent each of soda, 
 sulphuric acid, and chlorine, the sample analyzed that 
 year contained about thirteen per cent of sulphate of soda 
 (salt-cake), and eleven per cent of common salt. 
 
 The Chincha Islands, which have been the great source, 
 in past years, of Peruvian guano, lie near the coast of 
 Peru, barren granite rocks, with great depth of water 
 close by them, so that in places the largest vessels can 
 lay alongside and be loaded from the land by a shoot 
 entering into their holds. The guano, a thoroughly rotted 
 mass of bird-dung, in which are mixed feathers, carcasses, 
 and eggs, was from four to a hundred feet in depth. 
 
48 
 
 FERTILIZERS. 
 
 Old salts tell me that they brought up the same material 
 from deep bottom on the flukes of their anchors. Had 
 they said it looked the same, I should have believed them. 
 From twelve to fifteen million tons have been taken from 
 the Chincha Islands alone. Bat guano is sometimes ex- 
 tensively found in large caves in various parts of the 
 world, but it varies greatly in quality. 
 
 In applying guano, the Standard, which is especially rich 
 in ammonia, should be applied to those crops which are 
 especially ammonia-loving ; while the Lobos should be 
 used on those which need phosphoric acid more than 
 they do ammonia. The potash required beyond what the 
 guano contains may be added from muriate or sulphate 
 of potash. The quantity to be used will vary with the 
 condition of the soil in natural strength and richness by 
 manuring in past years, the range being from two hun- 
 dred and fifty to eight hundred pounds per acre. The 
 manner of applying will depend somewhat on the crops 
 to be raised ; but a good general rule is, to apply a part 
 before the crop is planted, and make one or two applica- 
 tions at different stages of its growth. If scattered broad- 
 cast, it should be harrowed in at once, to prevent the 
 escape of ammonia. That used in drills, I find it easy to 
 mix thoroughly with the soil by dragging through the 
 furrow the top of a stocky red cedar, to which a stone 
 weighing eight or ten pounds has been firmly tied ; or, a 
 brush-broom similarly weighted answers very well. When 
 used in the hill, the farmers who employ help will need 
 to look sharply after them ; for I find but very few farm- 
 hands take the care necessary to so thoroughly incorporate 
 it in the soil as to prevent the destroying of the young 
 plants. In all our handling of this powerful manure, we 
 must bear in mind the danger of bringing it in contact 
 with the young roots of the sprouting seed. I recall, that, 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 49 
 
 a dozen years ago, a foreman, who assured me he knew all 
 about the handling of guano, planted for me a couple of 
 acres of cabbage. A few days after they had broken 
 ground, I noticed the very dark color of the leaves, and, 
 mistrusting the cause, ran my fingers under the plants, and 
 brought up the pure guano. All that piece was replanted. 
 
 To insure, as near as possible, a thorough admixture 
 with the soil in hill-planting, I have a rule for each man, — 
 after the guano has been scattered over an area as large as 
 a dinner-plate, after covering it shallow, to draw his six- 
 tined fork three times through it one way, three times 
 through it the opposite way, and then, holding his fork per- 
 pendicularly in the middle, give it a twist around. Some 
 advocate mixing it with two or three times its bulk of earth 
 before applying it. While this insures a thorough mix- 
 ture with the soil, it adds considerable work to the labor 
 of distribution ; and, since the plan of dragging the cedar- 
 boughs in the drill has worked well, I have adopted that 
 as a saving of time. However, whenever there is any thing 
 of a breeze blowing, it is wise to adopt some such plan ; 
 otherwise your neighbors’ fields will be apt to share the 
 manure with you. Let me here say, that I have found it 
 an excellent plan, when distributing fertilizers, to take the 
 earlier part of the day ; for I find that, as a rule, the calmest 
 portion. It is a good plan, in handling almost any fertilizer, 
 except guano, — a little damp soil will answer for this, — 
 to have plenty of water at hand, and pour a half-bucket 
 now and then into the barrel you are spreading from ; 
 then stir it with a hoe until, while dry enough to spread 
 freely, it is too damp to blow away. If applying to the sur- 
 face, always do it, if possible, just before a rain. I some- 
 times use it on onions, to hurry up the bottoming of the 
 crops, — about two hundred pounds to the acre. Having 
 scattered it with the hand, immediately follow with a 
 
50 
 
 FERTILIZERS. 
 
 slide-hoe, to work as much of it as possible into the soil, 
 and so save loss of ammonia. This is an excellent fer- 
 tilizer to use, in connection with barnyard manure, in the 
 early season, to give the crops a start. 
 
 Market gardeners in the vicinity of our large cities 
 have but very little respect for phosphate and special fer- 
 tilizers, but, using from ten to twelve cords of stable 
 manure to the acre, think highly of guano at the rate of 
 a thousand pounds, or bone at the rate of two thousand 
 pounds, per acre as an adjunct ; or, when stable manure 
 alone is to be depended on, from twenty to thirty cords . 1 
 Now, it is the nitrates that start the plants of the mar- 
 ket gardener, and, as far as the guano goes, for this end 
 it is a wise use of it; but to develop nitrates in stable 
 manure requires a degree of heat that the soil does not 
 receive before the season is somewhat advanced. With- 
 out knowing it, gardeners are using this vast amount of 
 barn manure to get a small stock of plant-food, which 
 they have already at hand in the fertilizer market, readj^- 
 made, in the form of guano and nitrate of soda. A wise 
 head has suggested that they dispense with three-quarters 
 of the heavy manuring, and use one-half of the value of 
 this in investing in nitrate of soda, and put the balance 
 in their pockets as so much money saved. 
 
 In closing the subject of nitrogen, I cannot do better 
 than quote the able remarks of Professor Goessmann : 
 “ The air contains at all times carbonic acid, and in most 
 instances also nitric and nitrous acid and ammonia. The 
 soil absorbs, continually, more or less of the former, and 
 receives the nitrogen compounds in rain and snow. Once 
 absorbed by the soil, they find access to the plant by the 
 roots, as carbonates and nitrates, where they assist in the 
 
 1 Assuming the stable manure costs him $7 a cord, he saves from $70 ta 
 $120 by using a thousand pounds of guano. 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 51 
 
 formation of the organic portion of the plant. Besides 
 this direct support of plant-growth, they serve, also, the 
 very important purpose of increasing the supply of inor- 
 ganic plant-food ; for they aid in the disintegration of the 
 soil.” 
 
 Sulphate of ammonia, a by-product of works where coal 
 is used for the manufacture of gas, is one of the princi- 
 pal sources for nitrogen. It looks like rather coarse salt, 
 and is marketed from barrels up to huge tierces weigh- 
 ing from a thousand to fifteen hundred pounds. It is 
 readily soluble in water, but does not waste in the air. 
 Nitrate of potash (saltpetre) is usually too dear a source 
 for nitrogen to make it available. Nitrate of soda is 
 found in the interior of Chili, on the surface and in the 
 soil. It is a remarkably stimulating fertilizer, and, if there 
 is much rain, will waste before plants can take it up. Mr. 
 Lawes advises to apply it only when not more than three 
 feet in depth of the soil will be moistened. From one 
 hundred to two hundred pounds per acre is excellent to 
 give grass a start in the spring : it should not be applied 
 before the leaf has made a growth of three or four inches. 
 In dry seasons it is better and cheaper than sulphate of 
 ammonia, as the latter needs a degree of moisture to make 
 plant-food. Still, on the whole, the sulphate of ammonia 
 is considered the better investment : for, (1) it is not 
 likely to be lost in the atmosphere ; (2) it is not too solu- 
 ble ; (3) it has the power of clinging to the ingredients 
 of the soil, clay will hold it persistently, and even pure 
 sand, when washed with water, will retain a large portion 
 of it ; (4) its ammonia is easily changed into nitric acid 
 by ingredients in the soil. Nitrate of soda, we are told, 
 “'is very liable to be adulterated with white sand or 
 broken quartz, and with salt or the cheap potash salts. 
 . . . The purchaser should see that it dissolves entirely in 
 water, and does not taste distinctly of salt.” 
 
52 
 
 FERTILIZERS. 
 
 I sometimes use sulphate of ammonia to hurry along 
 crops of onions that are rather backward ; spreading two 
 hundred pounds per acre just before they begin to bottom, 
 and working it into the soil with a slide-hoe. 
 
 Castor-Pomace is a waste from the West, being the 
 cake left after the oil has been pressed from the castor- 
 beans. In using it, care should be taken to keep it where 
 animals cannot get at it. The men who spread it ought to 
 walk with the wind ; for, though not poisonous, it is a very 
 disagreeable customer for either the eyes or mouth. It 
 is a favorite manure for tobacco. I have used car-loads of 
 it in former years on general crops, with good results. 
 
 Azotin, Ammonite, Tankage. — The first two of these 
 are animal wastes, which have been exposed to the vapor 
 of naphtha to extract the grease. (Of late years glue- 
 waste, of which, in its crude state, for years I used from 
 one to two hundred cords annually, is also so treated.) 
 The residue is dry and brittle, and rich in ammonia, and 
 every way superior for fertilizing purposes to the same 
 substances before treatment. These are not usually found 
 in the retail market, but are purchased by manufacturers of 
 fertilizers at prices based on their per cent of nitrogen and 
 phosphoric acid, as shown by analysis in each lot offered 
 for sale. Job lots of from five to ten tons can sometimes 
 be purchased of brokers, or from great slaughtering estab- 
 lishments like that of Armour & Co. of Chicago. Tankage 
 is a waste product from the intestines and other parts : 
 it contains more or less of bone, easily crumbled, and is 
 not uniform in fineness. 
 
 Dried Blood is the blood of the slaughter-house with 
 most of the moisture dried from it, leaving it in good me- 
 chanical condition for handling. It is very rich in nitro- 
 gen, and is largely used by manufacturers of fertilizers. 
 There are two grades, the light and the dark colored ; 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 53 
 
 the latter being kiln-dried. Sometimes, when the heat is 
 too great* it is partially burned, to the destruction of a 
 portion of the ammonia. The nitrogen in blood acts very 
 readily as plant-food. 
 
 Cotton-Seed Meal had better be first fed, as the ma- 
 nure from it is almost as rich in fertilizing materials a? 
 was the meal before feeding ; for, as we have stated else- 
 where, full-grown animals take but a small per cent of the 
 potash, phosphoric acid, or nitrogen that exists in their 
 food, while butter takes none. Occasionally spoilt cotton- 
 seed meal can be found in the market that is nearly as 
 good for manure as the best of meal, and, being generally 
 valued at about three-fifths as much, is a very cheap source 
 for nitrogen and phosphoric acid. When spoilt by trans- 
 portation by salt-water, it is generally in very hard lumps, 
 which have to be ground in a mill. One high recom- 
 mendation that castor-pomace and cotton-seed meal have, 
 is, that their manure elements are in condition for imme- 
 diate use as plant-food. 
 
 Hoof and Horn Shavings and Leather. — All of 
 these are very rich in nitrogen, but it is not readily avail- 
 able, and therefore has a low value as a market article. 
 Hoof and horn shavings analyze as high as 11.81 nitrogen ; 
 and, if first steamed and then ground, the nitrogen they 
 contain becomes to a degree available. When used to 
 adulterate superphosphate, as they very rarely are, being 
 ground up, the particles can be readily detected by the 
 microscope. Horn-waste is mostly in thin, bulky shavings, 
 which are marketed in huge bags. Several years ago I 
 purchased a ton, to test its availability and value, not hav- 
 ing any idea of the peculiar mechanical condition of the 
 article. Standing at my door one morning, I saw a team 
 coming down the street with a bulk of bags piled as 
 high as a large load of hay. While wondering what new 
 
54 
 
 FERTILIZERS. 
 
 product had come to town, the driver stopped, when 
 abreast the house, and told me he had a ton of horn- 
 waste bearing my address. I got rid of the elephant the 
 easiest way possible, by tumbling it into the manure cellar, 
 and throwing the daily manure upon it until it disap- 
 peared from view. My men found combs, more or less 
 perfect, among the mass, enough to supply their families 
 for a year or more. This stuff is very rich in ammonia ; 
 but, though by layering it with horse manure it might be 
 softened and dissolved by fermentation, yet it is so bulky 
 that even at a low figure few farmers would care to invest 
 in it. 
 
 PHOSPHORIC ACID. 
 
 This, the third substance in the three components of a 
 complete fertilizer, is composed of the element phosphorus 
 combined with the gas oxygen. The four great resources 
 for phosphoric acid are the mineral called apatite, which 
 contains ninety-two per .cent of phosphate of lime, and is 
 believed by some scientists to be the original source in 
 nature from which phosphate of lime is derived; the 
 phosphatic guanos, which are the dung of sea-fowls from 
 which the ammonia has been washed out by the rain ; the 
 bones of all animals ; and the mineral phosphate rocks, 
 which are the remains of ancient marine animals. Min- 
 eral phosphates have within a few years been discovered 
 to exist, in almost limitless extent, in North and South 
 Carolina and Georgia, usually accompanying beds of marl, 
 either just above or just below them, and covering hun- 
 dreds of square miles. They exist largely as nodules of 
 rock, having holes or depressions on their surface filled with 
 worthless material, which makes it necessary to wash them 
 before grinding. That they are marine remains is evident 
 to the eye from their composition, which includes marine 
 shells and numberless sharks’ teeth, some being in a per- 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 55 
 
 feet state of preservation. Single teeth are sometimes 
 found as large as a man’s hand, weighing over two pounds. 
 These nodules were carted out of fields as waste, just like 
 any other rock, until the querying chemist touched them 
 with his wand. The rocks are ground, and the finer por- 
 tions of them, called “ floats,” sometimes applied directly 
 to the soil ; and when that is rich in organic matter, or 
 when vegetable matter can be added by ploughing under 
 green crops, it has been found to do quite well without 
 having been treated with acid. Says Professor Dabney of 
 the North-Carolina experimental station, “On sandy soils, 
 or soils destitute of vegetable matter, it appears to have 
 no effect whatever ; and, when tested by ammonium citrate, 
 but an insignificant portion of the finest ground, called 
 4 floats,’ was found to be soluble.” Composting in fer- 
 menting manure is recommended, to ascertain whether it 
 cannot be dissolved in sufficient quantity to economically 
 improve the manure. On some of the lands in Scotland 
 it has been used with success as a paying investment with- 
 out having been first treated with acid. 
 
 These mineral phosphates are the great source for 
 phosphoric acid; for, at the rate commercial fertilizers 
 are now used, bones could not begin to supply the de- 
 mand. The soluble phosphoric acid, whether made from 
 bones, apatite, phosphatic guanos, or the mineral phos- 
 phates of the Carolinas, have been found by careful tests 
 to be all of equal value as plant-food; though the pub- 
 lic, for old acquaintance’ sake, naturally prefer that made 
 from bones. Some manufacturers of fertilizers, from hav- 
 ing superior facilities for collecting them, and knowing 
 the prejudice of the public, get the phosphoric acid that 
 they use in their fertilizers wholly from bones. This much 
 may be said in their favor, that, should any of the bone 
 remain undissolved when treated with the acid, it would 
 
56 
 
 FERTILIZERS. 
 
 still have a value of from four to six cents per pound, 
 while in the finest ground Carolina rock it would be worth 
 but two cents and a half. The phosphate of lime, as it 
 exists in bones and the mineral rock, is made up of three 
 atoms of lime to one atom of phosphoric acid. In this 
 condition it is insoluble in water, though in bones slowly 
 soluble in the soil ; but if two of the parts could be got 
 rid of, then the remainder, made up of one part lime com- 
 bined with phosphoric acid, would be soluble in water. This 
 is accomplished by mixing sulphuric acid and water with 
 finely ground bone, or burnt bone, or finely ground min- 
 eral rock, when the two atoms of lime leave their home in 
 the bone or the mineral, and, combining with the sulphuric 
 acid, become sulphate of lime or plaster, leaving the phos- 
 phoric acid combined with but one atom of lime soluble 
 in water. After having been thus formed, under certain 
 conditions it sometimes takes to itself another atom of 
 lime, and becomes what is called 4 reverted,’ or, in other 
 words, has turned back again to an insoluble form. But 
 this two-part lime combination is readily decomposed and 
 rendered soluble when acted on by the carbonic acid pres- 
 ent in the soil, and when so acted on, being in the fine 
 mechanical condition that the action of the acid produced, 
 readily dissolves in water, and becomes plant-food. There 
 are a few terms used, in speaking of phosphate of lime in 
 different forms, that it will be necessary for us to become 
 familiar with. The insoluble combination of three parts 
 lime is often called bone-earth phosphate. When the 
 two parts of lime have been removed, and the phosphoric 
 acid has become soluble, it is often called acid phosphate, 
 but generally superphosphate of lime, the prefix 4 super ’ 
 being used to indicate that the lime has a proportion of 
 phosphoric acid greater than is natural to it. The term 
 4 soluble bone phosphate’ is criticised by Bruckner as a 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 57 
 
 misnomer ; for there cannot be such a thing as 4 soluble 
 bone phosphate, for bone phosphate is always in an insolu- 
 ble condition, and, when it is made soluble, it is no longer 
 a bone phosphate.” The term “ available ” phosphoric 
 acid is sometimes used. This includes both the soluble 
 and the reverted, as the latter soon becomes soluble in the 
 soil. 
 
 BONES, AND WHERE THEY COME FROM. 
 
 The bones of land animals are composed of the follow- 
 ing ingredients : — 
 
 Gelatine, fat, and water . . . . .48 
 
 Phosphate of lime, with a little magnesia . . .46 
 
 Carbonate of lime ....... 04 
 
 Potash and soda . ....... 02 
 
 100 
 
 The gelatine contains from three to five per cent of 
 nitrogen, and the phosphate of lime (or bone phosphate) 
 from eighteen to twenty-three per cent of phosphoric acid. 
 
 Bones are brought to the fertilizer market as the waste 
 of the slaughter-houses or butcher-shops, from the plains 
 of South America or the prairies of the West, or as 
 “ char,” or burnt bone, that has been used principally as 
 a purifier in the process of manufacturing sugar. This 
 latter is sometimes counterfeited by mixing lampblack 
 with mineral phosphates. Where they have been exposed 
 to the action of the elements, bones are found to have lost 
 more or less of their gelatine, and hence are not so rich 
 in nitrogen. The ways of preparing bone for plant-food 
 are numerous : by one class of processes the gelatine is 
 saved, and by the other lost. By burning bones either in 
 closed vessels — which produces the bone-black, or u char ” 
 — or in open fires, all the animal matter, which includes 
 the gelatine and oil, is consumed, and we have only phos- 
 
58 
 
 FERTILIZERS. 
 
 phate of lime remaining. To make the phosphoric acid 
 in this fully soluble, we must treat it to sulphuric acid ; 
 though the results from burning the bones are, to reduce 
 the particles to so fine a state as to make them more or 
 less available without the use of acid. 
 
 MAKING OUR OWN SUPERPHOSPHATE. 
 
 Dr. Nichols, in his clear, practical “ Barn-Floor Lecture,” 
 gives, in substance, the following plan : Take a plank box 
 four feet square and one foot deep. This may be simply 
 water-tight ; but, if so, rhere must be no nails that the acid 
 can reach, for it will eat them out and so make a leak : or 
 it may be lined with lead, as the doctor directs ; all solder- 
 ing to be done with lead solder. The box will be large 
 enough to take a carboy of sulphuric acid, with the neces- 
 sary quantity of phosphate material and water to make 
 about a quarter of a ton of superphosphate. If we take 
 finely ground bone, the result, following the doctor’s plan, 
 will be a pasty mass, needing mixing with muck, or 
 other dry material, to get it in good mechanical condition 
 for use. If, instead of bone, we use bone-black, as he ad- 
 vises, Ave shall have, as a result, a dry mass easily handled. 
 “To make our superphosphate,” says Dr. Nichols, “a car- 
 boy of one hundred and sixty pounds of sulphuric acid or 
 oil of vitriol (sixty-six degrees strength), three hundred and 
 eighty pounds of bone-black, and ten gallons of water, 
 are needed. Having first donned old clothes, and having 
 at hand a little saleratus or some alkali, ready to rub on 
 any spot, should, by chance, a drop of the acid spatter on 
 our clothes or boots (for where it touches, if not immedi- 
 ately neutralized, it will char like fire), be sure to first 
 pour in the water, and then the acid ; next \ slowly add the 
 bone, stirring it all the while with an old hoe of but little 
 value. There will be a great commotion, — a great boil- 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 59 
 
 ing and frothing and foaming and throwing-off of heat 
 with a suffocating vapor, which will make you think for a 
 moment that you have drawn your last breath. But have 
 courage : there have been a few millions of tons made be- 
 fore your day, and the men who made them yet survive. 
 Because of the suffocating vapor, it is well to do the work 
 in the open air or in an open shed. 
 
 In the report of the Connecticut experimental station 
 (1881), Professor Johnson gives two methods. That pro- 
 posed by Dr. Alexander Muller, Professor Johnson thinks 
 the one best adapted for domestic use of any of the pro- 
 cesses involving the use of oil of vitriol : “ Take one hun- 
 dred pounds of ground bone, such as contains twenty 
 to fifty per cent, more or less, of material coarser than 
 would pass through a sieve having a one-half inch mesh, 
 twenty-five pounds of oil of vitriol, and six quarts of 
 water. Separate the bone by sifting into two, or, if the 
 proportion of coarse bone is large, into three, parts ; using 
 sieves of one-sixteenth and one-eighth inch mesh.” Mix 
 the coarser part of the bone, in a cast-iron or lead-lined 
 vessel, with the oil of vitriol. When the bone is thor- 
 oughly wet with the strong acid, add the water, stirring 
 and mixing well. The addition of the water to the acid 
 develops a large amount of heat, which favors the action. 
 Let stand, with occasional stirring, for twenty-four hours, 
 or until the coarser fragments of bone are quite soft ; 
 then, if three grades of bone are used, work in the next 
 coarser bone, and let stand another day or two, until the 
 acid has softened all the coarse bone, or has spent its 
 action ; finally, dry off the mass by mixing well with the 
 finest bone. In carrying out this process, the quantity of 
 oil of vitriol can be varied somewhat, — increased a few 
 pounds if the bone has a large proportion of coarse frag- 
 ments, or diminished if it is fineo” 
 
60 
 
 FERTILIZERS. 
 
 Professor Stockhardt, the celebrated Saxon agricultural 
 chemist, gives the following process: “From a mixture 
 of sifted wood or coal ashes and earth thrown upon a 
 barn or shed floor, form a circular wall so as to enclose 
 a pit capable of containing one hundred weight of ground 
 bone ; then make the surrounding wall of ashes so firm 
 as not to yield by being trodden on ; sift off the finer 
 part of the bone, and set it aside ; throw the coarser part 
 into the cavity, and sprinkle it, during continued stirring, 
 with three quarts of water, until the whole is uniformly 
 moistened ; add gradually eleven pounds of oil of vitriol 
 of sixty-six degrees, the agitation with the shovel being 
 continued. A brisk effervescence of the mass will ensue, 
 which will not, however, rise above the margin of the pit 
 if the acid is poured on in separate small quantities. After 
 twenty-four hours, sprinkle again with three quarts of 
 water, add the same quantity of sulphuric acid as before, 
 with the same brisk shovelling of the mass, and leave the 
 substances to act for another twenty-four hours upon each 
 other. Then intermix the fine bone previously sifted off, 
 and finally shovel the ashes and the earth of the pit into 
 the decomposed bone, until they are all uniformly mixed 
 together.” 
 
 It will be noted, that the two last processes use half 
 or less than half the usual quantity of acid allowed for a 
 hundred pounds of bone. This is economy; for though, 
 by using more acid, we add to the weight of the mass, 
 still, all that is used over and above what is necessary to 
 make soluble the phosphoric acid in the bone, merely 
 increases the quantity of plaster present, at a cost of about 
 $28 per ton for the same, which is four times the mar- 
 ket price. From the small quantity of acid used, I infer 
 that it is assumed that the finest grade of bone is available 
 for plant-food, with but little help from the sulphuric acid. 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 61 
 
 By Dr. Nichols’s method, our available phosphoric acid 
 from bone-black will have cost us about as follows : — 
 
 380 pounds bone-black, at $22.50 per ton, or IT cents per pound, $4 27 
 170 “ oil of vitriol, at If cents per pound . * . 2 38 
 
 80 “ water. 
 
 630 
 
 63 one-tenth deducted for waste, steam, and evaporation. 
 
 567 pounds, costing . . . . . . . . $6 65 
 
 Cost per ton for home-made phosphoric acid, where bone- 
 
 black, or “ char,” is used 23 40 
 
 Price in the market per ton . . . . . . . 30 00 
 
 Cost of available phosphoric acid per pound, the average being 
 
 17 per cent nearly . . . . . . . . 0 07 
 
 Now, let us see what it would cost to make soluble the 
 phosphoric acid, or, in other words, to make a superphos- 
 phate, when 100 pounds of bones are used. 
 
 52 pounds sulphuric acid, at 1 cents . . . $0 92 
 100 “ fine bone, at If cents . . . 1 75 
 
 25 “ water. 
 
 177 
 
 17 loss in steam, gas, and waste. 
 
 160 pounds, costing $2 67 
 
 The superphosphate in a ton of bones would weigh 
 160 X 20 — 3,200 pounds ; and the cost, at the same rate, 
 would be, $2.67 X 20 = $53.40, which would be, for a 
 ton by weight, $33.37. The average price at which it is 
 sold in the market is $38. Difference in cost between the 
 home-made and purchased is $4.63. 
 
 To determine the profits of this operation, we must 
 deduct from the $4.63 the extra freight of the acid and 
 
62 
 
 FERTILIZERS. 
 
 bone over the freight on a purchased ton of the super- 
 phosphate, and a certain fraction of per cent to be allowed 
 on the breakage of carboys, which will occasionally occur 
 in transportation ; and the remainder, plus the advantage 
 of knowing that we have the real article, will be the re- 
 turn for our labor. Let us next see what the home-made 
 phosphoric acid will cost us when the mineral phosphate 
 is used. 
 
 The phosphate rocks of South Carolina supply us with 
 our cheapest source for soluble phosphoric acid. These 
 are richer in phosphate of lime than the deposits of North 
 Carolina, and require half more sulphuric acid to make 
 their phosphoric acid soluble. The cost of soluble phos- 
 phoric acid at the present market price for material, viz., 
 $13 per ton for finely .ground phosphate rock, and $28 per 
 ton for oil of vitriol, sixty-six degrees, is as follows : — 
 
 1,000 pounds phosphate $6 50 
 
 600 “ sulphuric acid . . . . 8 40 
 
 300 “ water. 
 
 1,900 “ total. 
 
 90 deducting 10 per cent for loss in gas and vapor. 
 
 1,810 pounds, costing $14 90 
 
 At 13 per cent, the soluble acid would be 235 pounds, 
 costing $14.90, or about 6^ cents per pound. 
 
 The phosphoric acid in finely ground bone can also be 
 made available by the caustic action of the potash in un- 
 leached wood ashes. Dr. Nichols recommends the following 
 method : “ Take 1 barrel raw bone flour, 3 barrels dry un- 
 leached wood ashes, 90 pounds gypsum, and 10 gallons of 
 water ; make a heap of the solid materials on the barn floor, 
 and add the water, stirring constantly with a hoe. The re- 
 sult is perfect plant-food, containing all the elements plants 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 63 
 
 require in about the same proportions.” Steamed bones, 
 burnt bones, bone-black, or char, cannot take the place of 
 the raw ground bone ; neither can any form of the German 
 potash salts take the place of the ashes : for animal matter 
 is needed in the bone, and potash in a caustic form in 
 the ashes, to produce the chemical action. Says Dr. 
 Nichols, “ Five barrels of this mixture to the acre is a 
 cheap and most effective dressing for any kind of a crop.” 
 The material used would cost, in Massachusetts, about 
 $7.50. I would advise using the mixture in the hill, with 
 about half the usual quantity of barn manure ploughed or 
 harrowed in. In my own practice I incline more and 
 more to keep the manure near the surface, that it may 
 have the advantage of all rains, to moisten and help dis- 
 solve the plant-food in it, for plants can take their food 
 only when in a liquid or gaseous state. With this end in 
 view, I surface manure for most crops, and work slightly 
 under with the wheel or some other good harrow. Mr. 
 Darling advises a little different method and proportions : 
 “ Mix 5 barrels finely ground bone with 5 barrels of un- 
 leached hard-wood ashes ; add water sufficient to moisten 
 the mass, and then cover with loam. Leave the heap three 
 weeks, adding a little water if it, on examination, appears 
 to be nearly dry.” Mr. Darling, who is well acquainted 
 with fertilizers, and might be presumed to know of what 
 he is speaking, says that the mass will be worth fifty dol- 
 lars per ton, which is at least double the cost of the mate- 
 rials that entered into the composition of the heap. 
 
 When bones are steamed under pressure, to extract 
 from them oil and gelatine, they are left in such a state 
 that when ground, I have found, on using a lot of a dozen 
 tons that had stood in heaps some months after having 
 been steamed, apparently as good effect on crops as though 
 they had been treated with acid. I found, that, when used 
 
64 
 
 FERTILIZERS. 
 
 in hills where cabbage-seed had been planted, they soon 
 softened into a soap-like mass. If the gelatine is taken 
 from them, with it they lose all the nitrogen ; and there- 
 fore their value as a fertilizer is to be measured solely 
 by the phosphoric acid which they contain, and this, I 
 think, would be classed with the form known as “ in- 
 verted.” Oil or grease in any form is not plant-food, 
 hence the loss of this is no loss to the farmer. As has 
 been stated, bones exposed to the weather lose more or 
 less of their nitrogen, and therefore are not so valuable 
 for fertilizing purposes. Professor Johnson states that 
 bone char is a little more certain as a fertilizer than finely 
 ground phosphate rock when the latter is applied to the 
 soil in its crude state, but it needs treating with oil of 
 vitriol to get from it the best results. 
 
 REDUCTION OF UNGROUND BONE. 
 
 Professor Johnson, in the report of the Connecticut ex- 
 periment station for 1881, gives several methods for the 
 reduction of unground bones, from which I make the fol- 
 lowing extract : “ If whole bones are treated with acid, 
 suitably diluted, it acts energetically on the bones at first, 
 and readily disintegrates them to a certain depth : unless, 
 however, a large excess of acid be used, the action soon 
 becomes sluggish, because, where the acid is in contact with 
 the bone, it forms sulphate of lime. Fresh acid must, then, 
 be brought in contact with the bone by abundant stirring, 
 in order to renew and maintain the action. The excess of 
 sulphuric acid rapidly absorbs moisture from the air : and 
 the final result is, the solution of the bone, or most of it, at 
 an expense of a wasteful excess of acid ; while the product 
 requires moisture, with something to take up the water, 
 and neutralize the excess of sulphuric acid. 
 
 “ On a small scale, cast-iron vessels could be employed. 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 65 
 
 A pit lined with blue flag-stones, or with hard bricks 
 closely laid in common lime mortar ( not cement), would 
 be more suitable for large quantities. After the bones are 
 disintegrated, the sloppy mass could be dried, and its excess 
 of sulphuric acid utilized by admixture of ground South 
 Carolina phosphate rock or other similar material, which 
 would thereby be converted into superphosphate.” 
 
 The Russian method is as follows : “ To 4,000 pounds of 
 whole bones, take 4,000 pounds (about 90 bushels) un- 
 leached hard-wood ashes, 600 pounds of fresh-burned lime, 
 and 4,500 pounds (562 gallons) of water. First slack the 
 lime to a powder (using part of the 4,500 pounds of water 
 for this purpose), mix it with the ashes, and, placing a 
 layer of bones in a suitable receptacle, — a pit in the 
 ground, lined with boards, slab, or brick, — cover them with 
 the mixture ; lay down more bones, and cover, and repeat 
 this until half the bones, 2,000 pounds, are inter-stratified 
 into the ashes and lime ; then pour on 3,600 (450 gallons) 
 pounds of water, distributing it well, and let stand. From 
 time to time add water, to keep the mass moist. As soon 
 as the bones have softened so they can be crushed between 
 the fingers to a soft, soap-like mass, take the other 2,000 
 pounds of bone, and stratify them in another pit, with the 
 contents of the first. When the whole is soft, shovel out 
 to dry ; and finally mix with dry muck or loam, enough to 
 make it handle well.” 
 
 Professor Johnson’s method is as follows: “ Arrange a 
 circular layer of bones, closely laid, on a bed, a foot thick, 
 of good loam, under shelter ; wet them from a watering- 
 pot, and sprinkle them over with wood ashes, enough to 
 fill all the chinks ; then give a coat of gypsum ; put upon 
 that a few inches of muck or loam, adding, all along, as 
 much water as will well moisten the earth and ashes, but 
 not more than the mass can readily absorb ; then place 
 
66 
 
 FERTILIZERS. 
 
 another layer of bones, with ashes, gypsnm, loam or muck, 
 and water, as before, until the heap is built up several feet ; 
 finally cover with loam, and keep moist by adding water 
 from time to time, but not enough to run away from the 
 bed. When the bones are sufficiently softened, mix well 
 together with the loam used on the bed, and cover with 
 loam.” Professor Johnson thinks this plan would require 
 more time, but perhaps would be as efficacious, and more 
 convenient than the process last described. 
 
 Fifteen or twenty years I tried to reduce a lot of bones 
 by a method like this, except that some lime was used with 
 the ashes. The results were not satisfactory ; possibly the 
 lot was kept too moist. 
 
 “ A third method suggested is by inter-stratifying them 
 with fermenting horse-dung, and keeping the mass moist 
 by covering with loam, and adding occasionally urine or 
 liquor from the dung heaps.” 
 
 Professor Johnson makes an estimate of the commercial 
 value of the product made by the Russian process : — 
 
 “ Four thousand pounds of average bones contain 4 per 
 cent, or 160 pounds, of nitrogen, and 20 per cent, or 800 
 pounds, of phosphoric acid ; 4,000 pounds of good wood 
 ashes, unleached, contain 8J per cent, or 340 pounds, of 
 potash, and 2 per cent, or 80 pounds, of phosphoric acid. 
 Therefore 
 
 “ 160 pounds of nitrogen, worth 20 cents . . . $32 00 
 
 880 pounds of phosphoric acid, worth 9 cents . 79 20 
 
 380 pounds of potash, worth cents . . . 18 70 
 
 $129 90 
 
 “ Admitting that there is no loss of nitrogen, and no loss 
 or gain of water, and taking no account of the loam, the 
 value of #129.90 would belong to 13,100 pounds, or 6J tons, 
 of the finished lime compost. The cost of one ton would 
 accordingly be, in round numbers, #20.” 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 67 
 
 The cost of the raw material would be about as follows : — 
 
 4,000 pounds of bone, at $20 per ton $40 00 
 
 90 bushels of unleached ashes, at 33 cents per bushel . . 30 00 
 
 600 pounds of lime 2 00 
 
 $72 00 
 
 Deducting one-tenth as waste in gases and evaporation, as $129 90 
 claimed by manufacturers of fertilizers . . . 12 99 
 
 $116 91 
 
 Deducting cost of raw material . . . . . . 72 00 
 
 We have left, to pay for our labor $44 91 
 
 At a meeting of the Massachusetts Horticultural Society, 
 Mr. William Hunt made an interesting statement of his 
 method of making the phosphoric acid in bones available. 
 He bought the elements bone and ashes, which he used 
 freely on grapes and strawberries, and was much pleased 
 with the results. He bought from three to ten tons of 
 bones per year, and ashes when he could get them. He 
 found that it did not pay to use acids to reduce bones : the 
 same money in potash would produce better results. Last 
 year he used from 1,800 to 2,000 pounds of potash, which 
 cost 4J cents per pound. It comes in casks of about four 
 hundred pounds each, and is as hard as stone. He uses 
 four or five parts of bone to one of potash. The bone, 
 which is ground, but not very fine, is spread in the barn 
 cellar. The potash is put, in large pieces, in a bag, and 
 there broken with a sledge-hammer, and put in a tight bar- 
 rel, into which was poured boiling water, and dissolved to 
 saturation. In handling the potash, care must be taken not 
 to get it on the clothes or person. It is then turned on 
 the bone, which sets up a great heat, evolving the nitrogen, 
 to absorb which, plaster is used. It is allowed to remain 
 two or three weeks, and is turned over several times, and 
 
68 
 
 FERTILIZERS. 
 
 every time covered with plaster. It is considerable trouble 
 to reduce bones in this way, but it gives a better return 
 for the money than buying fertilizers in the market. After 
 the potash has acted on the bone, large pieces can be 
 crushed in the fingers. He has used no other fertilizer 
 than this on his strawberries, and it is equally good for 
 grapes. He has put no animal manure on his grapes since 
 they were set out, but either ashes or bone and potash ; 
 and this treatment has been so satisfactory that he will 
 continue it. A neighbor has used a similar preparation of 
 bone and potash on his pear-trees, making the fruit better 
 and fairer. Mr. Hunt’s method would be apt to volatilize 
 a large portion of the nitrogen from the bones by the rapid 
 caustic action of the potash. 
 
 THE THEORIES OF FERTILIZING. 
 
 My little treatise, aiming at facts, can hardly stop to 
 discuss theories. When the able men who have spent 
 their lives in investigating plant-feeding differ fundamen- 
 tally in their views, which shall we, simple farmers, pin 
 our faith to? Boussingault values manures in proportion 
 to the ammonia they contain, making no account of the 
 mineral constituents. Leibnitz bases his value on what 
 he finds in the ash, and ignores the ammonia qualities. 
 Ville, in his theory of manuring, advocating the use of 
 nitrogen for wheat, potash for legumes, such as beans, 
 pease, etc., and phosphoric acid for roots, such as turnips, 
 parsnips, etc., considering potash — lime in some form — 
 and nitrogen as making a complete manure, advocates 
 manuring on poor soil with a combination of all of these 
 for the first crop, no matter what that may be, to the 
 end that the soil may be made a fertile one ; and, after 
 the first crop, to make each j^ear an application only of the 
 one element which is the preponderating one in the crop 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 69 
 
 we plant, varying the kind of crop each season, so that 
 each element in turn will be necessary, and thus, in the 
 course of three years, each will have been applied. I un- 
 derstand he holds, that, by this system of manuring, we 
 may continue indefinitely to raise crops, using yearly not 
 more than a single element for each. 
 
 The two theories that are especially advocated in our 
 day are what may be called the Stockbridge and the anti- 
 Stockbridge. The professor gave a great impulse to the 
 use of fertilizers when he laid his theory before the pub- 
 lic. It had in it a fascinating simplicity, and seemed to 
 present a short cut to success in farming. As tersely 
 stated, in its most advanced form, by the company who 
 are authorized to compound the formulas that bear his 
 name, it is, “ To feed plants those elements found by 
 analysis to enter into their composition, and which they 
 do not obtain from the soil or air in sufficient quantity ; 
 to feed the plant rather than the soil, and, in the feeding 
 of the plant, to select those forms of plant-food which 
 experience has shown are best adapted to produce perfect 
 growth.” The objections of those who do not believe in 
 formulas for different crops are, in brief, that the formu- 
 las are not constant, having varied in the course of four 
 years, — that for corn, from 4.7 to 6.2 for nitrogen, 3.8 to 
 7.2 for phosphoric acid, and 6.2 to 7 for potash ; in that 
 for the potato, from 3 to 4.4 in nitrogen, from 3.8 to 
 7 in phosphoric acid, and from 4.9 to 10.2 in potash ; 
 while in that for onions, the variation was from 3.1 to 3.9 
 in nitrogen, 5.3 to 6.4 in phosphoric acid, and 7.9 to 8.3 
 in potash. In studying the tables of differences, it is well 
 to bear in mind the remark of the distinguished Professor 
 Voelcker : “ Before a manure can be obtained that is spe- 
 cially adapted to particular soils or crops, it is necessary 
 that enterprising and intelligent men incur heavy expense, 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 70 
 
 in trying all kinds of fertilizing mixtures, before they can 
 succeed in ascertaining the states of combinations, and 
 the relative proportions in which these shall be combined, 
 in order to produce the best practical results.” 
 
 The original formulas published by Professor Stock- 
 bridge, in which his plant-food was determined solely by 
 analyzing the plant, — as further experience has thrown 
 light on the subject, the feeding-power of the plant hav- 
 ing been found to be a factor of importance, — have been 
 considerably modified. He has increased his phosphoric 
 acid for potatoes and grass about thirty-three per cent, for 
 corn fifty per cent, and in the two latter has decreased the 
 nitrogen about twenty-five per cent. In pease and beans 
 he has increased the phosphoric acid about fifty per cent, and 
 has decreased the nitrogen : and, further, some of the finer 
 distinctions have been dropped; and the formulas are now 
 generalized so far as to have in several instances the same 
 formula for several different crops, in this respect approach- 
 ing to the “Ville” theory of plant-feeding. The objec- 
 tion that the wide latitude shown in the extremes in the 
 nitrogen, po.tash, and phosphoric acid in the corn, potato, 
 and onion formulas, elevates them in real value at pres- 
 ent but little above a good superphosphate, has a degree 
 of weight. To my mind, it arises from the fact that 
 formulas, being for general use, can be compounded only 
 in a general way, by reason of the many differences in 
 the natural condition of various soils, the additional vari- 
 ations in the manurial elements which they may have 
 acquired through years of manuring, and the difference 
 between crops in their feeding capacity. Here, I think, 
 we have the weakness of the Stockbridge or any other 
 formulas. They do not take cognizance of the state of 
 the soil to which they are to be applied ; neither can they 
 do so, except in a general way, for otherwise they would 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 71 
 
 have to be modified to suit each particular case presented. 
 It is true that Professor Lawes says, that, after an experi- 
 ence of forty years, he knows little of certainty about the 
 soil ; what he has learned is, what plants feed on. This 
 seems to sustain the Stockbridge theory ; but when he 
 adds that he has learned, that, if he puts on an excess of 
 phosphoric acid or potash for any crop, he gets it back 
 in the next crop, his argument is one for the use of any 
 good fertilizer, rather than a formula. We all expect to 
 know more of the feeding-habits of plants, and the artificial 
 condition and natural character of soils, as years pass 
 on ; and, as this knowledge increases, the theory will have 
 the advantage of it, and be modified accordingly. The 
 Stockbridge theory gives us a starting-point. If we are to 
 wait, in all patience, until science points out a perfect way, 
 meanwhile we stagnate. 
 
 Take the case of Mr. Bartholomew, the results of whose 
 soil-tests are frequently alluded to in the reports of the 
 Connecticut experiment station. By testing his soil, he has 
 really learned something of great value to him, though the 
 man of science may well say, that, as a scientific experi- 
 ment, it lacks lots of conditions. Now, can any one believe 
 that Mr. Bartholomew need rest simply on the fact that 
 phosphate is the ruling element needed in his corn-crop ? 
 Can he not, by studying the effects of combinations of 
 fertilizers, and the modifications they receive by different 
 crops on different soils, gradually work nearer and nearer 
 to just the best proportion of each fertilizer to use in each 
 combination he makes for each crop ? and is not this work- 
 ing up to formulas ? Just as England, Scotland, and the 
 United States have each their man to thank for giving 
 vitality to the steam-engine, entirely aside from the man 
 who may have originated the elementary ideas, and will 
 always hold him in remembrance, though the* relation be- 
 
72 
 
 FERTILIZERS. 
 
 tween the original engine and the after-product may be 
 more that of striking contrast than one of resemblance, 
 so, I believe, we farmers ought always to feel a debt of 
 gratitude to the professor for starting on the farm the 
 formula system of manuring, thus insuring it a future 
 outside of the laboratory. All manufacturers of formulas, 
 as far as I have observed, now take into consideration 
 what they have ascertained of the feeding-habits of plants. 
 Now, let each farmer who uses formulas, ascertain, by 
 actual trial, the peculiar needs of his own soil, and modify 
 the application of these formulas accordingly, and he will 
 certainly have something better in his hands than the 
 best superphosphate in the market. 
 
 TESTING OUR SOILS. 
 
 Professor Atwater was the first in this country, as far 
 as my knowledge extends, to digest into a practical plan 
 the idea of testing our soils to ascertain which of the three 
 elements is especially lacking. The test is most satis- 
 factory on poor or worn-out soils. The fertilizers with 
 which to make these tests are put up seven in number, 
 making a full set, which is sold for seven dollars, — the 
 bare cost. The sets are not sold in parts ; they contain 
 the elements singly and in combination. The quantity of 
 each lot is sufficient for one-tenth of an acre, making fer- 
 tilizing material sufficient for seven-tenths in all. Corn, 
 potatoes, or any other crop, may be planted, leaving two 
 of the plots without any manure, on the remaining tenth 
 using the same value of barn manure. The design of these 
 experiments is, to enable farmers to settle the question in 
 which of the three elements, viz., nitrogen, potash, or 
 phosphoric acid, the soil is especially deficient, and which 
 combination of them is most needed to produce the crop. 
 Besides the set to settle these questions, others are put up 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 73 
 
 to enable the farmer to determine what form of nitrogen, 
 potash, or phosphoric acid is best adapted to his soil, or to 
 produce any particular crop ; also a set to determine what 
 special fertilizer was most profitable for any special crop. 
 These sets are supplied by the Mapes Formula and Peru- 
 vian Guano Company, 158 Front Street, New York; also 
 by the Bowker Fertilizer Company of Boston. I believe 
 Messrs. Mapes, and probably Bowker & Co., send out 
 explanatory circulars, giving full instructions how to use 
 them. Several of our agricultural papers have been very 
 active in encouraging this good work. I have used one 
 of these test sets on my own land with profit. 
 
 One fact may be safely inferred without a test; viz., 
 that all old pasture-lands, when brought under cultivation, 
 especially need phosphoric acid to give back to the soil 
 the great draught" that has been made upon it by the 
 phosphate carried away in the milk of cows and in the 
 bones of the young calf. I advocate the Stockbridge 
 theory as modified by the soil-test plan advocated by 
 Professors Atwater and Johnson: first, to determine by 
 actual tests what our soils lack, and then use the Stock- 
 bridge formulas, modified by the knowledge so obtained. 
 The fundamental idea is, that, to use manures economi- 
 cally, we must select those which fit the wants of the 
 special cases where they are to be applied. The old idea 
 of the practicability of analyzing the soil to determine 
 what plant-food it is necessary to apply, is exploded. It 
 is found, that, if ten times the amount of plant-food for 
 any crop is mixed with the soil, the chances are not one 
 in ten that the chemist can detect its presence. The crop 
 can do it far better than the chemist can. A few pounds 
 of guano applied to an acre of land would be found by 
 the crop, and make a difference in the yield ; while Pro- 
 fessor Johnson tells us, that, even if a thousand pounds 
 
74 
 
 FERTILIZERS. 
 
 were applied to an acre, the chemist might not be able to 
 detect its presence. 
 
 A FAITH THAT IS DANGEROUS. — BUYING CHEAP FERTIL- 
 IZERS. 
 
 There is a class of farmers who have a degree of faith 
 in fertilizers, but regard them as a sort of “ hodge-podge ” 
 combination of various ingredients sold as making things 
 grow, which sometimes hit it, and at other times miss it, 
 either because the maker missed his guess, or because he 
 deliberately intended to cheat his customers. Believing, 
 therefore, that one fertilizer is just about as likely to be as 
 good as another, they very naturally buy the cheapest in 
 the market, regarding the whole business as a mere lot- 
 tery. The want of knowledge that lies back of this 
 view of fertilizers reminds me of the doings of one of my 
 foremen some years ago. I sent him various materials for 
 a compost heap, and also a lot of unleached ashes, guano, 
 and hen-dung, with particular directions what to mix, and 
 which of the various materials to keep separate. When I 
 came, a while after, to view the state of affairs, I asked to 
 see his manure piles. He showed me his compost heap. 
 I then asked for the ashes, hen manure, and guano. “ It’s 
 all there, boss,” said he, pointing to the compost heap ; 
 “ and, I tell you, it’s the greatest manure heap you ever 
 saw.” I thought so, too : hen manure, guano, unleached 
 ashes, glue-waste, rotten sea manure, tumbled together 
 pellmell, and the free ammonia generated filling the air 
 with its pungent fumes ! I had it covered at once with 
 dry muck, and then endeavored to enlighten him on the 
 difference between a “ hodge-podge ” of material, and a 
 compost heap intelligently put together. 
 
 I was told of an instance where last season a market 
 gardener, a man of superior ability in some departments 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 75 
 
 of his business, having used fertilizers in former years, 
 believing that the more of a good thing the better, in 
 planting his drill-crops, cut a hole in each bag of fertilizing 
 material, when two men would walk along the rows, carry- 
 ing the bag between them until it was empty. A gentle- 
 man told me, who saw his potatoes dug, that at that time 
 the fertilizer would turn up two or three inches deep under 
 them. This gardener used sixty or more tons in this way ; 
 and more or less of his crops, as might have been antici- 
 pated, were any thing but a success. 
 
 The w r ords “ cheap ” and “ cheat ” are almost synony- 
 mous when applied to fertilizers offered for sale. Consider 
 the matter a moment. Potash, nitrogen, and phosphoric 
 acid, the three ingredients which give to them about all 
 their value, have become regular market articles in every 
 form in which they are found, whether in bones, fish-waste, 
 phosphate rock, German potash salts, slaughter-house waste, 
 cotfon-seed, tankage, or in any other combination in which 
 they come into the market. When a dealer has any of these 
 for sale, and offers them to manufacturers of fertilizers, he 
 (the manufacturer) takes an average sample of the lot, 
 puts it into the hands of his chemist, who at once analyzes 
 it, and reports what per cent of nitrogen, phosphoric acid, 
 or potash, as may be, the article contains. The manufactur- 
 ers purchase it on that basis ; viz., so much per pound for 
 either ingredient : in valuing it, reference being had to the 
 degree of availability in which they exist in the articles 
 offered. Potash, nitrogen, and phosphoric acid being, 
 therefore, regular market articles, how can any manu- 
 facturer undersell his fellow-dealers with a fertilizer of 
 equal value ? The whole thing is governed by the common 
 rules of business. It can only be by using more capital, 
 and so buying his raw materials on a larger scale, and thus 
 getting the reduction that any man in any business gets; 
 
76 
 
 FERTILIZERS. 
 
 or by improved machinery, improved processes of manu- 
 factures ; or, finally, by selling more than his fellow-dealers, 
 and so being able to afford a smaller profit on each ton. The 
 difference in the selling-price of fertilizers turns, then, on 
 how much of nitrogen, potash, and phosphoric acid enter 
 into their composition, modified by the above-named cir- 
 cumstances. 
 
 The analyses published by the able chemists at the 
 head of the various agricultural colleges are the great 
 check on frauds, and, in general, a very safe guide to the 
 farmer as to the richness of the various fertilizers in the 
 market, though they do not pretend to be able to tell 
 whether any particular one is cheaper for him to use than 
 barn manure, is best adapted to his soil, or to produce 
 profitably any particular crop : this is a matter that the 
 farmer must determine for himself. The fertilizer laws of 
 the different States have driven most of the “ cheap and 
 cheat” class from the market. If any one is interested 
 in knowing what these laws have accomplished for the far- 
 mer, let him read the last chapter of Bruckner’s work on 
 “ American Manures,” where he will find analyses of 
 eleven fertilizers that were advertised in 1870 for an aver- 
 age price of $50 per ton, the average of whose real value, 
 aside from the insoluble phosphoric acid in their composi- 
 tion, proved to be but $13.75 per ton. It is good advice 
 to buy no fertilizer of which you have seen no analysis 
 published in the bulletins or annual reports of some of our 
 agricultural colleges. There is one just now being sold in 
 Eastern Massachusetts by a new firm which is little or 
 nothing more than a mixture of ashes, lime, and salt. 
 
 With the best of helps, we take as much risk in our pur- 
 chases as wise men should take ; for the chemist does not 
 tell us always whether our phosphoric acid was derived 
 from bones or the mineral rock, or our nitrogen from fish 
 or flesh, or the practically worthless leather scraps. 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 77 
 
 MAKING OUR OWN FERTILIZERS. 
 
 There is one way by which a fertilizer can be afforded 
 at a price lower than the standard price of the three ele- 
 ments that enter into its composition ; and that is, by using 
 such local waste materials as are not accessible to dealers 
 in general. Dead animals and surplus fish supply these 
 material in some localities. If farmers in the vicinity of 
 large towns would start some one in the business of work- 
 ing up the carcasses of horses, cows, and other animals 
 that die from disease, accidents, or are killed because they 
 can no longer serve their masters, they might have a cheap 
 source for superphosphate ; for in the hides, manes and 
 tails, oil, grease, gelatine, hoofs, and horns, the manufac- 
 turer would find sources of income which would enable 
 him to offer the waste, in the shape of a superphosphate, 
 at a figure below the average market rate. 
 
 Where it is necessary to have heavy machinery to grind 
 bone or other materials, it is a question whether either the 
 individual farmer or an association of farmers can make 
 it a profitable investment. I know one instance where 
 farmers associated, and, buying machinery, ground bones, 
 treated them with acid, and so made their own superphos- 
 phate. The leader in the enterprise stated that it did not 
 pay when they could get an honestly made phosphate at 
 the average market price. The Cumberland Superphos- 
 phate Company, in Maine, an association of individuals 
 who have in their employ experienced chemists, was organ- 
 ized, I understand, for the special purpose of supplying the 
 members of the association with an honest superphosphate 
 as cheaply as it could be afforded. I am told that pecuni- 
 arily this is not a successful enterprise ; and any one who 
 looks at the analysis in the Maine “ Report of the Inspector 
 of Fertilizers ” will see the reason why, — they are selling 
 
78 
 
 FERTILIZERS. 
 
 an over-good article. If the farmers of Maine will buy 
 Red Beach at $45 per ton, when the analysis shows a valua- 
 tion of but $26.19, and pass by Cumberland, which sells 
 $40.83 worth of fertilizers for $40, why, they are not as 
 shrewd Yankees as they have the credit of being. Here 
 naturally arises the question, why a fertilizer that by 
 analysis is shown to be of a low grade in value, sometimes 
 may give better returns than one of higher cost. It is 
 generally because it may have had more of one of the three 
 elements than the better fertilizer, and hence may have 
 been better adapted for some particular crop to which it 
 was applied ; whereas the more costly one would have 
 shown returns commensurate with its cost had it been 
 applied to the right crop. Where bone-black, ground 
 bone, or finely ground phosphatic rock is used, it will pay 
 farmers to make their own superphosphate when the pro- 
 cess of Dr. Nichols, and especially that of Professor 
 Stockhardt and Dr. Muller, are followed, as given on p. 
 61. For the past three years I have made, more or less, 
 my own superphosphate. 
 
 THE MANUFACTURERS OF FERTILIZERS. 
 
 I have no war to wage against the manufacturers of 
 fertilizers. The degree of dishonesty and carelessness or 
 ignorance of former years is now rendered impossible in 
 many localities by State laws and the frequent reports of 
 the agricultural chemists. The manufacturer is a neces- 
 sity that we farmers cannot do without. He brings to the 
 business the knowledge and the capital necessary to handle 
 the various great wastes in the most economical manner to 
 get therefrom fertilizing materials. Most of them have 
 one, and some of them two, chemists constantly in their 
 employ ; and one, I know, has ten thousand dollars invested 
 in a building wholly devoted to the single department of 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 79 
 
 repairing machinery. They have the expense of work- 
 men, clerks, costly rents, travelling-agents, to meet (one 
 has eleven), and allow a profit to the retail dealer. 
 While those engaged in many occupations turn their capi- 
 tal several times a year, making more or less of profit every 
 time, the sales of the manufacturer of fertilizers are lim- 
 ited to a few months in the year ; and these are made on 
 long time ; so that, from the date they invest money in 
 crude materials, to the time they receive pay for the same, 
 is nearer two years than one. In the table from our ex- 
 perimental stations, comparing the value of the various 
 fertilizers with the market price of the materials that 
 enter into their composition, we rarely see credit given 
 for the bags in which they are packed. These must cost 
 not far from a dollar and a half for each ton of fertilizers, 
 while many rot, and have to be replaced before they leave 
 the establishments. From considerations such as these, it 
 appears but fair to concede to the manufacturer, as his just 
 due, an advance on the cost of the materials he handles 
 sufficient to cover the interest on his plant, the cost of 
 production and of selling, with a fair profit added. 
 
 Professor Dabney gives good testimony to the honesty 
 of manufacturers when he says, that, of the six hundred 
 samples of fertilizers analyzed in North Carolina, but one 
 was found in which there was an attempt to defraud in 
 the element ammonia ; and that, if I remember correctly, 
 was in an imported English superphosphate. 
 
 LEATHER-WASTE. 
 
 This consists of the scraps of the shoe-manufactories, 
 the waste from the uppers and soles. In many of the 
 establishments it is burnt as fuel, to which there is the 
 objection that the creosote formed from it destroys the mor- 
 
80 
 
 FERTILIZERS. 
 
 tar in chimneys. Owing to its richness in ammonia, and 
 the facility with which, when steamed under pressure, it 
 granulates into a fine blood-colored powder, or readily 
 grinds up after being charred, it has been largely used by 
 ignorant or unprincipled manufacturers as a source for 
 nitrogen in their fertilizers, several of the States having, 
 until recently, required by law the per cent of nitrogen, 
 without designating in what form it should or should not 
 be. The gelatine present, though rich in ammonia, is 
 rendered by the tannic acid nearly insoluble, and hence 
 for annual crops is practically worthless. This adultera- 
 tion has been carried on to a far greater extent than the 
 public is aware. Tens of thousands of tons have been so 
 disposed of, as I have been informed by those behind the 
 scenes. In the Massachusetts Agricultural Report for 
 1882, it is stated that leather scraps were offered in Boston, 
 early in the season, in a fine state of subdivision, at $5.50 
 per ton ; but later , in the month of May , they advanced to 
 $15 per ton. The cause of this advance, it would require 
 no great wit to perceive. It is said that from four thou- 
 sand to five thousand tons were sold ini and about Boston 
 that year, to be used in the manufacture of fertilizers. If 
 every State would require the dealers to state the source 
 from which their nitrogen was obtained, the adulteration 
 would soon cease, for every chemist has at hand the 
 means of detecting its presence. Though the process is a 
 slow one, leather scraps, even the coarsest, from sole 
 leather, will eventually decay ; but this fact gives no value 
 to them for the growing of annual crops, for they need to 
 be years in a mass before they will turn black and rot. I 
 have used tons of them around currant-bushes, where 
 they serve to keep down weeds, and in the course of years 
 entirely disappear, becoming plant-food. If used into 
 tillage-land, they become a nuisance, for more or less of 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 81 
 
 them will keep working to the surface, where the hoe, 
 coming in contact with their tough substance, will be 
 bounced out of place, with the danger of cutting off the 
 plants among which you are at work. The only other 
 really profitable use of these scraps by farmers is for 
 covering over blind drains, to keep the soil from sifting 
 down among the stones or tile. I have used them in 
 covering miles of such drains, and know of nothing as 
 good, especially where the sole-leather waste is used. I 
 have one that was made nearly thirty years ago, where the 
 scraps — over small stones, with tile below — appear to be 
 as useful as at the first. 
 
 SOME FACTS AND SUGGESTIONS. 
 
 In using potash or phosphoric acid in any form, we will 
 not forget that it never wastes in the soil to any extent ; 
 and, if there is more applied than a crop needs, the next 
 crop will find it. “ Fertilizers rich in ammonia, Peruvian 
 guano, sulphate of ammonia, etc., should be applied, a 
 little at a time, and often.” Clayey soils do not, as a rule , 
 need so much potash or nitrogen as phosphoric acid. 
 Nitrogen tends to promote leaf-growth. Fertilizers ap- 
 plied to poor land produce more effect than when applied 
 to rich land. In twenty-five experiments with various fer- 
 tilizers, under the direction of Professor Atwater, it was 
 found that the most important factors in the growth of 
 the corn-crop were, first, the soil ; next, the season. It 
 was a sensible and suggestive remark of Mr. Bartholomew, 
 that, if the bone in the soil does not all decompose the first 
 year, the nitrogen contained in it goes over with it — is 
 not wasted. If but one of the commercial fertilizers is to 
 be used, let it be bone. The finer the bone, and the finer 
 and dryer the fertilizer, the more valuable it is. “The 
 most profitable fertilizers,” says Professor Atwater, “ are 
 
82 
 
 FERTILIZERS. 
 
 those that fit special cases. ... To compost fish-waste with 
 plaster and earth is more economical than to treat it with 
 acid.” “The soil,” says Professor Ville, u is the medium 
 in which we convert at pleasure phosphoric acid, potash, 
 and nitrogen into any crop we choose to grow.” When 
 the animal matter in bones decaj^s, the phosphoric acid in 
 the bones, say our scientific teachers, is in a reverted con- 
 dition. Says Professor Atwater, “ The common impression 
 among farmers, that the best use of artificial fertilizers is 
 to supplement farm manures, is doubtless, in ordinary 
 circumstances, correct.” Both Mr. Lawes and Professor 
 Ville are of the opinion that the largest crops are grown 
 by chemical manures. Salt-cake (sulphate of soda) con- 
 tains about forty per cent of sulphuric acid, and is an 
 excellent material to check decomposition. Under this 
 plea, it is used by some manufacturers with altogether too 
 liberal a hand in their fertilizers, for of itself it is of but 
 little value as plant-food. Nitre-cake, the refuse from 
 the manufacture of nitric acid, contains about forty-seven 
 per cent of sulphuric acid, and is an excellent material to 
 scatter over manure heaps, to hold the ammonia. The 
 difference between nitrogen in barnyard manure and in 
 ammoniacal salts (sulphate of ammonia, etc.) was strik- 
 ingly shown in some of the experiments of Mr. Lawes, 
 where forty-one pounds of nitrogen in the latter produced 
 as great effect on a crop of barley as did two hundred 
 pounds in the former. Dr. Voelcker found in perfectly 
 fresh horse-dung but one pound of free ammonia in fifteen 
 tons, though there was nitrogen enough to supply one 
 hundred and forty pounds of it. This suggests the wis- 
 dom of first composting, and so decomposing and making 
 it soluble, when we want prompt effects. Barnyard ma- 
 nures decompose faster in porous (sandy or gravelly) soils 
 than in compact ones. Says Professor Goessmann, “ Good 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 83 
 
 manuring increases the quality as well as the quantity of 
 our crops. . . . Besides salt-cake (as mentioned above), 
 nitre-cake, ground oyster-shells, spent lime, plaster, and 
 soil are mixed with ground bone as preservatives, dryers, 
 or adulterants.” 
 
 In purchasing our elements out of which to make fertil- 
 izers, their degree of fineness or dryness has an important 
 bearing on their value. Says Professor Goessmann, “ The 
 mechanical condition of any fertilizing material, simple or 
 compound, deserves the most serious consideration of 
 farmers, when articles of a similar chemical character are 
 offered for their choice. The degree of pulverization con- 
 trols, almost without exception, under similar conditions, 
 the rate of solubility, and the more or less rapid diffusion 
 of the different articles of plant-food throughout the soil. 
 The state of moisture exerts a no less important influence 
 on the pecuniary value in case of one and the same kind 
 of substance. Two samples of fish fertilizers, although 
 equally pure, may differ from fifty to a hundred per cent in 
 commercial value, on account of mere difference in moisture. 
 If obliged to increase our home resources of manure, he 
 advises to compound fertilizers from the most suitable stock 
 in the market. Although a first trial of that course of 
 action may not realize all the advantages expected, there 
 can be no doubt about the correctness of the statement, 
 that the best financial success on the part of the farmer 
 can ultimately be secured only by the gradual adoption of 
 that system of manuring the farm. Our leading dealers in 
 fertilizers begin to realize the late tendency in their trade, 
 and are preparing to meet the call.” 
 
84 
 
 FERTILIZERS. 
 
 COMMERCIAL RETAIL VALUES OF FERTILIZING INGRE- 
 DIENTS IN RAW MATERIALS AND CHEMICALS. 
 
 Cents per Pound. 
 
 For the Years 
 
 1881. 
 
 1882. 
 
 1883. 
 
 1884. 
 
 Nitrogen in sulphate of ammonia .... 
 
 224 
 
 29 
 
 26 
 
 22 
 
 44 44 nitrate of soda 
 
 26 
 
 26 
 
 20 
 
 18 
 
 44 44 dried and finely ground fish . . 
 
 20 
 
 24 
 
 23 
 
 20 
 
 Organic nitrogen in guano and fine-ground 
 
 
 
 
 
 blood and meat 
 
 20 
 
 24 
 
 23 
 
 18 
 
 Organic nitrogen in cotton-seed, linseed meal, 
 
 
 
 
 
 and in castor-pomace 
 
 16 
 
 18 
 
 18 
 
 18 
 
 Organic nitrogen in finely ground bone 0 . 
 
 15 
 
 17 
 
 17 
 
 18 
 
 44 4 4 4 4 fine, medium bone . . 
 
 14 
 
 15 
 
 15 
 
 16 
 
 4 4 4 4 4 4 medium bone 0 „ . . 
 
 13 
 
 14 
 
 14 
 
 14 
 
 4 4 44 44 coarse, medium bone . 
 
 12 
 
 13 
 
 13 
 
 12 
 
 44 44 44 44 bone, horn shav- 
 
 
 
 
 
 ings, hair, and fish-scraps 
 
 11 
 
 11 
 
 11 
 
 10 
 
 Phosphoric acid soluble in water .... 
 
 124 
 
 12* 
 
 11 
 
 10 
 
 4 4 4 4 4 4 ammonia citrate . . 
 
 9 
 
 9 
 
 8 
 
 9 
 
 4 4 4 4 insoluble in dry, finely 
 
 
 
 
 
 ground fish, and in fine bone 
 
 6 
 
 6 
 
 6 
 
 6 
 
 Phosphoric acid insoluble in fine, medium 
 
 
 
 
 
 bone 
 
 54 
 
 54 
 
 54 
 
 54 
 
 Phosphoric acid insoluble in medium bone . 
 
 5 
 
 5 
 
 5 
 
 5 
 
 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 coarse, medium 
 
 
 
 
 
 bone 
 
 44 
 
 44 
 
 44 
 
 44 
 
 Phosphoric acid insoluble in coarse bone . . 
 
 4 
 
 4 
 
 4 
 
 4 
 
 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 finely ground 
 
 
 
 
 
 rock phosphate 
 
 34 
 
 3 
 
 2f 
 
 24 
 
 Potash as high-grade sulphate 
 
 7i 
 
 7 
 
 7 
 
 74 
 
 44 kainite 
 
 54 
 
 5 
 
 44 
 
 44 
 
 44 muriate 
 
 44 
 
 5 
 
 44 
 
 44 
 
 The retail rates average about twentj^ per cent higher 
 than the wholesale rates of this table. As a rule, fertilizing 
 materials are cheapest in the fall and winter. At the time 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 85 
 
 of writing (spring of 1885), nitrogen in some forms is 
 somewhat higher than last season. 
 
 The word “organic” in the above table may be practi- 
 cally ignored by us farmers when figuring on these 
 fertilizers. The table is an estimate of relative commercial 
 values agreed upon by the chemists and directors of the 
 experimental stations of Massachusetts, Connecticut, and 
 New Jersey. In point of fact, competition forced prices 
 below these rates, as will be noted in the following table, 
 which gives the prices at which the nitrogen, phosphoric 
 acid, and potash were sold in various combinations in 1884 
 by leading dealers : — 
 
 Cents. 
 
 Average cost per pound of nitrogen 
 
 in nitrate of soda 
 in sulphate of ammonia 
 in dried blood . 
 in ammonite and tankage 
 in dried fish 
 in castor-pomace 
 in hair manure . 
 
 16.9 
 
 17.1 
 
 18.3 
 15.8 
 12.5 
 
 20.2 
 
 10.3 
 
 Average cost of phosphoric acid from bone-black, soluble in water, 7.3 
 cents; insoluble, 2.9 cents. 
 
 Average cost of soluble phosphoric acid from South Carolina rock, 
 8.6 cents; insoluble, 1.9 cents. 
 
 Cents. 
 
 Average cost of potash per pound in muriate . . . .3.7 
 
 “ “ “ “ in kainite . . . .4.0 
 
 in sulphate 
 
 7.2 
 
 The above are the retail prices, delivered on cars or 
 boats. 
 
 Professor Cook of the New Jersey experimental station, 
 from which valuable report the above table was taken, 
 states that the samples analyzed by the station in 1884, in 
 five cases out of six contained more plant-food than their 
 minimum guaranties demanded: they were better than 
 the manufacturers claimed. 
 
86 
 
 FERTILIZERS. 
 
 COMMERCIAL AND AGRICULTULRAL VALUES OF FERTIL- 
 IZERS. 
 
 The prices in the above tables are the market or com- 
 mercial value of the three elements. Says Professor Cook, 
 “ The agricultural value of a fertilizer — in other words, the 
 profit which its use secures for a farmer in an increased 
 crop — is in no way indicated by its market price. R^ftble 
 information concerning agricultural values must be sought 
 upon the farm, and not by the guesses of the farmer, but 
 from the actual weight of the crops grown under krfcwn 
 conditions, and upon accurately measured areas.” Hot or 
 cold, wet or dry, seasons, will affect the results obtained 
 from fertilizers, but cannot be said to affect their commer-^ 
 cial value ; in fact, the average of numerous experiments 
 demonstrates that these extremes have a greater effect on 
 crops fed on barn manure than on those fed by fertilizers. 
 
 WHERE TO OBTAIN OUR FERTILIZING MATERIAL AT THE 
 LOWEST COST. 
 
 The table (84) directs us for what substances to inquire 
 when we go into the general market. But there are out- 
 side sources which are more or less accessible to the aver- 
 age farmer. Even in the varied products of the farm, the 
 three elements vary greatly in cost. 
 
 Professor George Caldwell makes the following esti- 
 mates of the value of nitrogen, potash, and phosphoric 
 acid in various combinations. Assuming that in 1884 
 potash could be purchased at 5 cents per pound, phos- 
 phoric acid at 9, and nitrogen at from 16 to 18 cents, 
 then, at these rates, — 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 87 
 
 
 Cost of 
 Nitrogen 
 per Lb. 
 
 Cost of 
 Potash. 
 
 Cost of 
 Phos- 
 phoric 
 Acid. 
 
 In cow manure, at $1.16 per thousand pounds 
 
 Cents. 
 
 Cents. 
 
 Cents. 
 
 (about $7 per cord) 
 
 In H>rse manure, at $1.54 per thousand 
 
 19 
 
 6 
 
 11 
 
 pounds (about $6.90 per cord) 
 
 In rock- weed, at $1.21 per thousand pounds 
 
 14 
 
 4i 
 
 7A 
 
 (about $4.25 per cord) 
 
 In night-soil, at $0.43 per thousand pounds, 
 
 20i 
 
 6-ni 
 
 6* 
 
 the price of collecting 
 
 In tanner’s waste (clippings of hides and 
 
 2A 
 
 1 
 
 1A 
 
 hair), at $0.78 per thousand pounds . . . 
 
 1 
 
 - 
 
 i 
 
 In hen manure, at $4 per thousand pounds, 
 
 27 
 
 8ttt 
 
 15 
 
 The tanner’s waste would decompose slowly, and there- 
 fore its components would practically be of less value than 
 in the other manures named. At 43 cents per thousand 
 pounds, night-soil would cost about $2.50 per cord. As 
 average night-soil is worth about $6 per cord, the professor 
 evidently means a purer article than we farmers usually 
 find. Most farmers will be surprised at the low value 
 given hen manure in 'the table, but it requires a pretty 
 good article to reach even that valuation. Hold fast to 
 the fundamental principle, that no more value in potash , 
 phosphoric acid , and nitrogen can come from the manure of 
 any animal than is fed to it in its food , minus the quantity 
 of these elements taken up to maintain its vitality, and 
 perform its various functions, which in fowls includes the 
 eggs laid and the annual growth of feathers. And next 
 consider the fact that two bushels of corn will support an 
 average fowl a year, and that this grain contains about 
 38 cents in value of the three elements; and, finally, that 
 of this, but about half can be found in the manure, of 
 
88 
 
 FERTILIZERS . 
 
 which but about half can be saved, making a little over 
 a quarter of the 88 cents in the manure saved from a 
 fowl annually. Where we are so situated that we can go 
 outside the general market for our fertilizing elements, We 
 can sometimes pick them up at a very cheap rate. The 
 present season (1885) I have purchased at the town of 
 Gloucester, Mass., fish-waste in the form of liver, halibut, 
 and herring chum at a remarkably low figure, — the liver 
 chum at $4 per ton, which would make the nitrogen in it 
 come to about 4\ cents per pound, and the phosphoric acid 
 at about 14 cents. Halibut chum is now worth $8 per ton, 
 which would bring the nitrogen in that form about 8 cents 
 per pound, and the phosphoric acid 2i cents per pound. 
 Fish-skins, by which I mean the skins, bones, and fins 
 stripped from fish, which are sold under the name of “ bone- 
 • less fish,” are sold this season in Gloucester at the low figure 
 of $4 per ton. I have not an analysis at hand ; but they are 
 very rich in both ammonia and phosphoric acid, having 
 about 4.50 of the former, and 6 of the latter. They are 
 very salt, being stripped from salted fish. In this form the 
 ammonia cannot cost over 6 cents, or the phosphoric acid 
 over 2 cents, per pound. “ Chum,” or pomace, from waste 
 mackerel or herring, is sold the present season as low as 
 $6.50 per ton. There is usually a large per cent of salt 
 in its composition. The ammonia at these rates cannot 
 be over 6 cents, and the phosphoric acid over 2| cents, per 
 pound. 
 
 I would have my farmer friends understand that the 
 above rates are lower than usual, — about, on an average, 
 from a third to a half the usual price ; still, at the usual 
 prices of material, fish-waste is the cheapest source for 
 nitrogen. 
 
 Says Professor Goessmann, u Manufacturers put it in a 
 better mechanical condition, and sell it at about $34 per 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 89 
 
 ton, or an advance of from two hundred to four hundred 
 per cent.” In these forms, about all the ammonia may be 
 assumed to be available the same season they are used, 
 and from one-half to two-thirds of the phosphoric acid. 
 As these fish-wastes are usually heavily charged with salt 
 (used when fresh, to keep them), it is the best plan to use 
 them on salt-loving crops, as cabbage, onions, and mangel- 
 wurzels. They can either be spread on the surface in the 
 fall, harrowed in, or slightly ploughed under, or be com- 
 posted in the spring with barn manure into which enters 
 a good proportion of horse manure. Be sure to cover the 
 heap, especially the top, with dry earth and plaster. These 
 wastes are usually bought up by manufacturers of fertil- 
 izers ; and the surplus to be found in the market, acces- 
 sible to farmers, is never very large. I have used them 
 for many years somewhat extensively, having fifty tons of 
 them at the present time, mostly composted with barn 
 manure and rock-weed. 
 
 As my treatise is for the benefit of my fellow-farmers, 
 I will give the addresses of parties who deal in these and 
 other fertilizing materials at first hand ; though it may not 
 be the wisest thing for me to do, viewed from a pecuniary 
 stand-point, as it will tend to send me to a dearer market. 
 
 Dealer in fish-skins, Fred L. Stacey of Gloucester, Mass.; 
 dealers in liver and halibut chum, A. W. Dodd & Co. of 
 Gloucester, Mass., and Messrs. Parker & Smith, Derby 
 Wharf, Salem, Mass. 
 
 Dealers in unleached Canada ashes, Messrs. Munroe, 
 Judson, & Stroup, Oswego, N.Y. 
 
 Dealers in ammonite, M/L. Shoemaker (he has two 
 grades), Philadelphia, Penn. 
 
 Dealers in tankage, John Taylor & Co., Trenton, N. J. ; 
 Armour & Co., Chicago (in ten-ton loads). 
 
 The list might be indefinitely extended, but I give the 
 
90 
 
 FERTILIZERS. 
 
 addresses of those who deal in fertilizing material not 
 often found by farmers in the market. The reports from 
 the various agricultural experimental stations contain the 
 addresses of almost numberless manufacturers and dealers 
 in superphosphates, potash, and ammonia. 
 
 FORMULAS, AND HOW TO COMPOUND THEM. 
 
 From what I have written, my farmer friends will see 
 that I do not present the formulas I have used as the best 
 guide for them to follow. Their soil, in its natural or arti- 
 ficial condition, may differ from my own ; and so these 
 formulas would require modification accordingly. In my 
 own practice, perhaps, all these may be improved ; while I 
 know the one for beans and pease can be : and I expect 
 to find, from some indications, I can dispense with more 
 or less of the potash on most of my land. 
 
 It will be noticed that they are all what are known as 
 “ complete ” manures ; that is, each has all three of the 
 essential elements of plant-food. It is quite possible, that, 
 on land that has been manured for a series of years, espe- 
 cially if by stable manure, the potash probably, and the 
 phosphoric acid possibly, may be in excess of the needs 
 of crops, and therefore can for a while be omitted from 
 formulas ; but in such case we need to be on the watch 
 to detect when the limit is reached, and govern ourselves 
 accordingly, bearing in mind that the quantity of crop is 
 always measured by the element of which the soil has the 
 smallest quantity, and that a large quantity of one ele- 
 ment will not help the crop over a deficiency in either of 
 the others. This is the reason why, when, for instance, 
 fish is used liberally, a manure especially rich in nitrogen, 
 for a while there are enormous crops ; but they soon grow 
 less, even under a heavier application. The trouble is, 
 the potash of the land has been exhausted. That this is the 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 91 
 
 trouble can be proved by using manures rich in potash, 
 when fertility will return. My farms, four of them, are 
 made up of land ranging from sandy loam to strong loam 
 and reclaimed meadow. They have been under cultiva- 
 tion from one to ten years. During the first five years 
 they were dressed with various manures, and more or less 
 with commercial fertilizers ; during the last five years I 
 have depended more and more on commercial fertilizers, 
 using, of the three ingredients which compose these, from 
 thirty-five to forty-five tons annually. Much of this I 
 have used in connection with barnyard manure, using the 
 latter broadcast, and the fertilizer in the drills. I say 
 drills, for I have not planted corn, beans, or potatoes in 
 hills for the past dozen years ; neither do I believe that 
 any of my farmer friends, after once giving the drill 
 system a fair trial, will ever go back to the old way. 
 
 FORMULAS FOR VARIOUS CROPS. 
 
 The following table of formulas for various crops are 
 such as are used by fertilizer dealers of good repute. I 
 present them as good starting-points, to be followed or 
 varied as the characteristics of each field, as developed by 
 the soil-tests, may indicate. The figures in the first three 
 columns indicate the per cent of ammonia, etc., needed. 
 In the next they indicate how many pounds of the mixture 
 to apply. 
 
92 
 
 FERTILIZERS. 
 
 
 Ammonia, 
 per cent. 
 
 Potash, 
 per cent. 
 
 Phos- 
 phoric 
 Acid, 
 per cent. 
 
 Lbs. 
 
 Potatoes 
 
 6 
 
 8 
 
 5 
 
 500 to 1,000 
 
 Corn 
 
 2} 
 
 6 
 
 7 
 
 600 “ 1,000 
 
 Cabbage and cauliflower . . . 
 
 6 
 
 7 
 
 5 
 
 1,000 “2,500 
 
 Squash 
 
 6 
 
 7 
 
 5 
 
 1,000 “ 1,500 
 
 Tomatoes 
 
 6 
 
 7 
 
 5 
 
 750 “ 1,000 
 
 Fruit and fruit-bearing vines . 
 
 2i 
 
 11 
 
 8 
 
 600 
 
 Oats 
 
 5 
 
 9 
 
 5 
 
 8 
 
 SO 
 
 o 
 
 © 
 
 Rye 
 
 5 
 
 9 
 
 5 
 
 400 “ 600 
 
 Strawberries 
 
 Si 
 
 8 
 
 6 
 
 600 “ 800 
 
 Raspberries 
 
 Si 
 
 8 
 
 6 
 
 600 “ 800 
 
 Asparagus 
 
 5 
 
 9 
 
 6 
 
 500 “ 700 
 
 Wheat 
 
 6 
 
 3 
 
 U 
 
 200 “ 600 
 
 Barley 
 
 6 
 
 3 
 
 71 
 
 200 “ 600 
 
 Grass 
 
 6 
 
 7 
 
 5 
 
 400 “ 700 
 
 Melon 
 
 6 
 
 7 
 
 5 
 
 1,000 “ 1,600 
 
 Tobacco 
 
 6* 
 
 8 
 
 4 
 
 1,000 “ 2,000 
 
 Onion 
 
 5 
 
 9 
 
 5 
 
 1,000 “ 2,000 
 
 Cucumber 
 
 5* 
 
 7 
 
 5 
 
 1,200 “ 1,600 
 
 Turnips 
 
 5 
 
 8 
 
 7 
 
 400 “ 600 
 
 Carrot 
 
 7 
 
 9 
 
 5 
 
 650 “ 900 
 
 Beet 
 
 7 
 
 9 
 
 5 
 
 400 “ 800 
 
 Celery 
 
 7 
 
 9 
 
 5 
 
 1,000 “ 1,400 
 
 Lettuce 
 
 7 
 
 9 
 
 5 
 
 1,000 “ 1,400 
 
 Pease and beans 
 
 2 
 
 71 
 
 8 
 
 500 “ 800 
 
 Cotton 
 
 2i 
 
 4 
 
 71 
 
 300 
 
 Hops 
 
 Si 
 
 13 
 
 5 
 
 1,000 
 
 Sugar-cane 
 
 2i 
 
 71 
 
 8 
 
 800 
 
 In these formulas, all the phosphoric acid is to be avail- 
 able; that is, either soluble or reverted, and mostly of the 
 former. It will be noticed that all these formulas are 
 complete fertilizers ; that is, contain all of the three essen- 
 tial elements of plant-food. Let me again enjoin on my 
 fellow-farmers, when using a portion of them in the drill, 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 98 
 
 in order to prevent destroying the seed, to mix thoroughly 
 with the soil before planting ; using the top of a cedar-tree 
 to which a stone has been tied, dragging it along through 
 the furrow, or a brush barn-broom, or even a hoe if care- 
 fully dragged. With extra care in mixing for crops such 
 as corn, the whole of the fertilizer might be used in the 
 furrows or hill ; but no good farmer would, as a rule, raise 
 his crop in that way. With potatoes, fertilizers are some- 
 times successfully applied by first covering the potato with 
 an inch of earth, and then sowing it, finishing by covering 
 the seed to the usual depth. A portion can be applied to 
 the corn-crop after it is up ; but in such cases it must be 
 cultivated under, or the plant will get but little benefit 
 from it. 
 
 In using these formulas, if you live near a good market, 
 your vegetable crop will bring more than it otherwise 
 would ; while your land, and probably your labor-bill, will 
 be higher than it would be back in the country, and the 
 cost of the fertilizer will be as cheap or cheaper. Such 
 being the case, it would be wise to use the larger quantity 
 named, and to experiment a little to ascertain whether or 
 not, under your exceptional circumstances, it might not 
 pay you even to increase this. Fertilizers, as has been 
 said, do not respond so well on soil that has been heavily 
 enriched with barn and other manures for a series of years. 
 On very rich truck-farms, some fertilizers, even when lib- 
 ‘erally applied, have but little effect. In such cases the 
 ground is already heavily stocked with the surplus left 
 over by many manurings, and will sometimes yield full 
 crops without help from any manure whatever ; but usually 
 nitrate of soda, sulphate of ammonia, guano, or bone will 
 give good paying returns, even on such soil. I have 
 made use of the above formulas, with excellent results, on 
 crops of potatoes, corn, pease, beans, tomatoes, cucumbers, 
 
94 
 
 FERTILIZERS. 
 
 melon, squash, onions, oats, grass, beet, and Hungarian 
 millet. 
 
 HOW TO COMPOUND OUR OWN FORMULAS. 
 
 To start with, we will aim to get our three elements 
 from more than one source, believing that the greater the 
 variety from which they are obtained, the better it will be 
 for the varied and varying wants of the crop. In making 
 up my formulas, I start with some one fertilizer, and then 
 add to it, from various sources, what I need to complete 
 it. To illustrate, let us take the first on the list, that for 
 potatoes. 
 
 The potato formula calls for : ammonia, 6 per cent ; pot- 
 ash, 8 per cent ; phosphoric acid, 8 per cent ; quantity re- 
 quired, 1,000 pounds. That is, of this 1,000 pounds, 6 per 
 cent, which is 1,000 X -06, must be ammonia, = 60 pounds ; 
 8 per cent potash, that is, 1,000 X -08, = 80 pounds ; 
 and 8 per cent phosphoric acid, = 1,000 X .08, = 80 
 pounds. The formula would stand thus : — 
 
 Ammonia. Potash. Phosphoric acid. 
 
 Wanted: 60 pounds. 80 pounds. 80 pounds. 
 
 Let us start with a superphosphate, which we will 
 assume to analyze as follows : Ammonia, 3.50 ; available 
 phosphoric acid, 11. From this we will supply the phos- 
 phoric acid needed in the formula, which, as there are 11 
 pounds in every hundred, will require as many hundred 
 pounds as 11 is contained in 80, which will be 7 hundred, 
 and T 3 T , which would be just about 27 pounds more, making 
 727 pounds in all. Now, in taking these 727 pounds of 
 the phosphate, as each hundred lias, besides the phosphoric 
 acid, 3J pounds of ammonia, we have at the same time 3J 
 per cent of 727 pounds of this element, = 25 pounds: we 
 have thus obtained all the phosphoric acid needed in our 
 formula, and (60 — 25 = 35) all but 35 pounds of the 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 95 
 
 ammonia. As the ammonia in the phosphate was doubt- 
 less from bone, let us get the remainder from sulphate of 
 ammonia, which is a form in which it will act more 
 promptly, and start the crop, while that from bone will 
 feed it later in the season. Now, sulphate of ammonia 
 contains 25 per cent pure ammonia : therefore we get our 
 remainder of ammonia in about |~| of a hundred pounds, 
 = 140 pounds of sulphate of ammonia. Passing next to 
 the potash needed, viz., 80 pounds, let us get part of it 
 in muriate of potash, and part from wood ashes, where the 
 potash is the carbonate of potash. 80 per cent of muriate 
 of potash contains just above 50 per cent (50.46) of pure 
 potash. Taking a hundred pounds of this, and we have 
 remaining, to be got from unleached ashes, 88 — 50, = 38 
 pounds. Now, a hundred pounds of unleached wood 
 ashes, containing about 7 per cent of carbonate of potash, 
 would contain about | as much of pure potash, f of 7 = 
 4 j- pounds ; 38 -f- 41 = 9^- hundred pounds nearly. As 
 unleached wood ashes weigh about 45 pounds to the 
 bushel, in 9J hundred pounds there would be about 21 
 bushels. Now, using these ashes, we have also brought 
 with them some phosphoric acid, for wood ashes unleached 
 has about two per cent of it ; therefore in our 21 bushels 
 we should have 21 x 2 = 42 pounds. Let us take 
 away sufficient of the bone to allow for the 42 pounds. 
 As the bone has 11 per cent, we will drop as many hun- 
 dred pounds as 11 is contained in 42, = 4 nearly. But, in 
 dropping these 450 pounds of bone, we, of course, drop 
 also the ammonia contained in it, which would be 4J X 3J, 
 = 16 pounds nearly. To get this 16 pounds of am- 
 monia, we will take some dried blood, which analyzes 13 
 per cent ammonia. It would require of 100 pounds of 
 this, = 133 pounds nearly. Now, bringing all the sources 
 together, and we have 
 
96 
 
 FERTILIZERS. 
 
 Acid phosphate 
 Sulphate of ammonia . 
 Unleached wood ashes . 
 Dried blood . 
 
 Lbs. 
 
 727 - 450 = 277 
 . 88 
 . 950 
 . 133 
 
 1,448 
 
 We have for our formula, which called for 1,000 pounds 
 of a fertilizer containing ammonia, 6 per cent, potash, 8 
 per cent, and phosphoric acid, 8 per cent, a compound 
 containing 1,448 pounds. I know that the question will at 
 once occur to my farmer friends, How can this be correct, 
 as only 1,000 pounds were called for? True, but that was 
 to be of a given strength, while the elements in this will 
 not average as rich as the elements in that, and therefore 
 more bulk is required. If, instead of taking the ashes, we 
 had taken our entire supply of potash from the muriate, 
 then the result would have been a compound weighing 
 less than 1,000 pounds, for the reason that the average of 
 the materials would have been richer. This illustration, 
 which I have purposely made to cover about all possible 
 variations, covers the whole matter of compounding our 
 own formulas. What we now need to ascertain is, where 
 we can get our own raw materials the cheapest. The 
 various facts presented in other portions of this treatise, 
 especially under the heads of “ Potash,” “ Nitrogen,” and 
 “ Phosphoric Acid,” with the tables to be found on pp. 
 Ill and 112, will inform us from what source to obtain 
 the cheapest materials needed to compound these or any 
 other formulas. 
 
 SOME FORMULAS AS COMPOUNDED. 
 
 I herewith present the way I have compounded several 
 formulas for my own use, not as the wisest course in the 
 selection of material, but. as suggestive in the variety of 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 97 
 
 substances from which the three elements are obtained. 
 The per cent of ammonia, potash, and phosphoric acid is 
 the same for each variety of vegetable as those given in the 
 table on p. 92. The quantity applied has, in each case, 
 the larger amount. The “ Ames bone ” is an honest super- 
 phosphate made by a reliable neighbor, A. L. Ames of 
 Peabody, Mass. I will here say, that, while on old land, I 
 have had excellent results from the potato fertilizer four 
 years in succession, raising crops that averaged, with differ- 
 ent years, from 200 to 317 bushels per acre in fields con- 
 taining eight acres, on pasture land broken up for the first 
 time, the results have not been so satisfactory. 
 
 FORMULAS OF FERTILIZERS. 
 
 Pease for One Acre. 
 (Half harrowed in, Half in Brill.) 
 
 600 lbs. Arnes bone. 
 
 250 lbs. muriate of potash. 
 
 40 lbs. dried blood. 
 
 Potatoes for One Acre. 
 
 500 lbs. Ames bone, in drill. 
 
 50 “ sulphate ammonia, in drill. 
 
 75 lbs. cotton-seed meal, or 50 lbs. 
 guano, in drill. 
 
 200 lbs. muriate of potash, in drill. 
 
 Vegetable Vines for One Acre. 
 (Three-fourths harrowed in, One-fourth in Brill.) 
 
 600 lbs. Ames bone. 
 
 100 “ sulphate ammonia. 
 
 100 lbs. dried blood. 
 
 200 “ cotton-seed meal. 
 
 200 lbs. muriate of potash. 
 
 Carrots or Beets for One Acre. 
 (Harrowed in.) 
 
 400 lbs. Ames bone. 
 
 100 “ sulphate ammonia. 
 
 mmonia. I 200 “ cotton-seed meal. 
 160 lbs. muriate of potash. 
 
 100 lbs. dried blood. 
 
98 
 
 FERTILIZERS. 
 
 Beans for One Acre. 
 
 (Half harrowed in, Half in Brill.) 
 
 550 lbs. Ames bone. | 33 lbs. sulphate ammonia. 
 
 110 lbs. muriate of potash. 
 
 Hungarian for One Acre. 
 
 (Harrowed in.) 
 
 400 lbs. Ames bone. | 150 lbs. muriate of potash. 
 
 50 lbs. sulphate of ammonia. 
 
 Corn for One Acre. 
 
 (Half harrowed in, Half in Brill). 
 
 600 lbs. Ames bone. i 160 lbs. sulphate of ammonia. 
 
 200 4 4 cotton-seed meal. | 180 44 muriate of potash. 
 
 Grass for One Acre. 
 
 (Harrowed in.) 
 
 400 lbs. Ames bone. I 150 lbs. muriate of potash. 
 
 100 “ dried blood. I 100 44 sulphate of ammonia. 
 
 Onions for One Acre. 
 
 (Baked in before Ploughing.) 
 
 700 lbs. Ames bone. 
 
 100 44 dried blood. 
 
 400 44 cotton-seed meal. 
 
 200 lbs. muriate of potash. 
 
 *250 44 sulphate ammonia, or 300 
 guano. 
 
 Oats for One Acre. 
 
 (Harrowed in.) 
 
 300 lbs. Ames bone. 35 bushels unleached hard-wood 
 
 150 44 dried blood. ashes. 
 
 25 44 sulphate of ammonia. 
 
 CONDENSATION OF SPECIAL AND OTHER FORMULAS. 
 
 Professor George H. Cook, of the New Jersey experi- 
 mental station, gives five formulas, which contain the 
 three elements in about the same proportion as they were 
 found by analysis to exist in seventy-two different brands 
 of fertilizers, of which thirty-six were sold specially for 
 various crops, such as potatoes, corn, buckwheat, etc. In 
 
 * To slide in when they begin to bottom. 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 99 
 
 calculating the proportions of crude materials to use in 
 making up a ton of fertilizer by either of these formulas, it 
 was assumed that — 
 
 Sulphate of ammonia contains 20 per cent of nitrogen. 
 
 Nitrate of soda contains 16 44 44 44 44 
 
 Blood and ammonite contain 12 44 44 44 44 
 
 Bone-black superphosphate 
 
 contains 16 44 44 44 available phosphoric acid. 
 
 Acid phosphate from South 
 
 Carolina rock contains 12 44 44 44 44 4 4 44 
 
 Muriate of potash contains 50 44 44 44 potash. 
 
 Kainite contains 12 44 44 44 44 
 
 No difficulty will be experienced, says the professor, in 
 securing supplies of these guaranteed to contain the above 
 percentages of plant-food. 
 
 Class No. 1. — This is a small class, containing three 
 brands, and includes all of the fertilizers in which the guar- 
 anteed nitrogen does not exceed one per cent. 
 
 Class No. 2. — This is a large class, containing twenty- 
 four different fertilizers, of which sixteen are intended for 
 general use, and eight are specially designed for fruit, 
 tobacco, potatoes, lawn-dressing, hops, and buckwheat. 
 
 Class No. 3. — This class includes eighteen different 
 fertilizers, of which eleven are for general use, and seven 
 are specially designed for sorghum, potatoes, etc. 
 
 Class No. 4. — This class includes twenty-one different 
 fertilizers, of which five are for general use, and sixteen 
 are specially designed for grain, tobacco, potatoes, and 
 vegetables in general. 
 
 Class No. 5. — This contains six fertilizers, of which 
 five are for special crops, — tobacco, lawn-dressing, grain, 
 and vegetables. 
 
 The value of the plant-food in an unmixed condition, 
 given in each formula, was calculated by using the manu- 
 facturers’ average retail prices for 1884. 
 
100 
 
 FERTILIZERS 
 
 Class No. 1. 
 
 To make One Ton when mixed together. Containing Lbs. of 
 
 Blood 110 lbs. Nitrogen. 13.2, or 0.66 % of ton. 
 
 South Carolina rock (treated 
 
 with acid) 1,600 “ Phos. acid, 192.0, “9.60% “ 
 
 Kainite 250 “ Potash . 30.0, “1.50% “ 
 
 Total 1,960 lbs. 
 
 Cost of materials unmixed $19.36. 
 
 
 Class No. 2. 
 
 
 To make One Ton when mixed together. 
 
 Containing Lbs. of 
 
 Nitrate of soda 
 
 Ammonite 
 
 140 1 “ S " } Nitr °S en • 32.80, or 1.64% of ton. 
 
 South Carolina rock (treated 
 
 
 
 with acid) 
 
 1,400 “ Phos. acid, 168.00, “8.40% “ 
 
 Muriate of potash .... 
 Kainite 
 
 50 “ i Potash 
 300 “ ) 
 
 . 61.00, “3.05% “ 
 
 Total 
 
 1,990 lbs. 
 
 
 Cost of materials unmixed . . . . 
 
 . . $21.49. 
 
 
 Class No. 3. 
 
 
 To make One Ton when mixed together. 
 
 Containing Lbs. of 
 
 Sulphate of ammonia . . 
 
 50 lbs. j 
 
 
 Nitrate of soda 
 
 100 “ [ 
 
 • Nitrogen . 47.0, or 2.35 % of ton . 
 
 High-grade blood .... 
 
 175 “ ) 
 
 
 South Carolina rock (treated 
 with acid) 
 
 1,450 “ 
 
 Phos. acid, 174.0, “8.70% “ 
 
 Muriate of potash .... 
 
 125 “ ( 
 
 , , ( 
 
 •Potash . 74.5, “3.78% “ 
 
 Kainite 
 
 100 “ ) 
 
 Total 
 
 2,000 lbs. 
 
 
 Cost of materials unmixed . 
 
 .... $25.31. 
 
 
 Class No. 4. 
 
 To make One Ton when mixed together. 
 
 Containing Lbs. of 
 
 Sulphate of ammonia . . . 
 
 100 lbs. 
 
 
 Nitrate of soda 
 
 100 “ ; 
 
 f Nitrogen . 72.00, or 3.60% of ton. 
 
 High-grade blood .... 
 
 300 “ 
 
 
 Bone-black superphosphate . 
 
 940 “ 
 
 Phos. acid, 150.00, “ 7.50 % “ 
 
 Muriate of potash .... 
 
 100 “ 
 
 | Potash . 110.00, “5.50% “ 
 
 Kainite 
 
 500 “ ! 
 
 Total 
 
 2,040 lbs. 
 
 
 Cost of materials unmixed . 
 
 .... $27.46. 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 101 
 
 Class No. 5. 
 
 To make One Ton when mixed together. Containing Lbs. of 
 
 Sulphate of ammonia . . . 
 
 150 lbs. 
 
 
 Nitrate of soda 
 
 200 44 J 
 
 f Nitrogen, 104.00, or5.20%of ton. 
 
 High-grade blood .... 
 
 350 44 
 
 
 Bone-black superphosphate . 
 
 875 44 
 
 Phos. acid, 140.00, “ 7.00% “ 
 
 Muriate of potash .... 
 
 75 44 i 
 
 j- Potash . 80.00, “4.00% “ 
 
 Kainite 
 
 350 44 ! 
 
 Total 
 
 2,000 lbs. 
 
 
 Cost of materials unmixed . 
 
 .... $31.06. 
 
 HOW TO MIX THE INGREDIENTS THAT ENTER INTO A 
 FORMULA. 
 
 Now let us try our hand at mixing together the ingredi- 
 ents that enter into a formula. As a base from which to 
 start, I have taken a local superphosphate made honestly 
 by Mr. A. L. Ames of Peabody, Mass., and have added to 
 this, plant-food from various sources. In mixing the vari- 
 ous ingredients together, you will need a sieve as fine again 
 as a common coal-sieve. Having cleared a place upon the 
 barn floor, and having decided upon quantities of each 
 element needed, first weigh these out, and have them near 
 at hand ; next, sift each lot that needs sifting, by itself 
 separately, breaking up with your feet or the back of the 
 shovel all lumps that will not pass through the sieve. 
 Now begin with the element you need most of, and sift a 
 portion of it evenly over a circle of sufficient width so that 
 the first layer will not be over an inch in depth. Follow 
 with the next, using about the same proportions as of the 
 first, and thus on until you have a proportion of each. Go 
 back again and repeat the process, until the quantities 
 weighed out are used up. If the entire mass is but six or 
 eight inches in depth, it will mix the easier. To mix, an 
 iron-toothed rake may be used ; cutting it down, and mixing 
 it, and ending by throwing it together with a shovel. If 
 well mixed , the entire mass will be of a uniform color. In 
 
102 
 
 FERTILIZERS. 
 
 many fertilizers, as I have stated before, all forms of pot- 
 ash, except the carbonate which is found in wood ashes, 
 and one form of crude potash, can be safely mixed with 
 any fertilizer without loss of ammonia. My farmer friends 
 will remember that I have before this recommended that 
 potash in any form would be likely to do most good if 
 spread on in the late autumn or early in the spring. When 
 wood ashes are used as a source of potash in formulas, I 
 would spread it separately, harrowing it in, and raking in 
 the remainder of the formulas. 
 
 APPLYING FERTILIZERS. 
 
 A man needs a little experience to get them evenly dis- 
 tributed. It is well to practise a bit at first. Suppose, for 
 instance, we want to scatter six hundred pounds over an 
 acre of land : that would be one pound to every seventy- 
 two square feet, or a piece of land about eight and a half 
 by eight and a half feet. If we desire to strew, say, three 
 hundred pounds in the drill, the drills being three feet apart, 
 there would be about fourteen thousand feet of drill to the 
 acre, which would give one pound to about forty-five feet 
 of row. One trouble to be met with in distributing fer- 
 tilizers is the wind, which during the planting-season is 
 apt to begin to blow as soon as the air gets warm in the 
 morning, generally slacking up toward night. It is best, 
 therefore, when possible, to put several hands on to spread 
 them, either early in the morning, or toward the close of 
 day. Otherwise, it would be well to have a few buckets 
 of water handy, and pour into the barrels enough at a 
 time to gently moisten by stirring the contents of each, 
 being careful to have them dry enough to distribute freely. 
 To mix them in the drill so that they will not burn the 
 seed, I use often the thick top of a cedar-tree to which a 
 stone has been securely fastened. This, dragged once 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 103 
 
 through the bottom of the furrow, will mix Peruvian 
 .guano, or any fertilizer, so thoroughly that it will not 
 injure the seed. It has been found in practice, and is now 
 generally advocated by dealers in fertilizers, that, as a gen- 
 eral rule, it is a better plan to use barn manure and fertil- 
 izers together on the same crop, as far as circumstances will 
 permit ; using the barn manure broadcast, and the fertilizers 
 in the drill or hill, to give the crop a start. In my own 
 practice I have not paid much respect to the rule, and 
 thus far am very well satisfied with the results. I believe 
 that farmers, as a general rule, would do better for many 
 crops to use their manure on their grass, and so get a good 
 sward, and depend on this, turned under, for the bulky 
 vegetable matter when using fertilizers ; for most of the 
 difference between fertilizers and barn manure is the 
 presence of a bulky mass of vegetable matter in the latter, 
 which not only acts mechanically to lighten heavy soils, 
 but frees the plant-food locked up in all soils; and this 
 the sward would supply. 
 
 THE SYSTEM OF MANURING WITH UNLEACHED WOOD 
 ASHES. 
 
 The firm that probably sells the most unleached ashes 
 in New England and the Middle States, Messrs. Munroe, 
 Judson, & Stroup, Oswego, N.Y., gives the following direc- 
 tions for its use. As I know that excellent crops have 
 been raised by following a portion of their instructions, I 
 will give them in full under their proper heads ; though 
 we must remember, that, although ashes contain all the 
 mineral elements in plant-food, it is wholly lacking in 
 nitrogen, and there must come a time when, the accumu- 
 lation in the soil having been used up, most crops will need 
 to have nitrogfen fed to them in the manure. They advise 
 for all crops, to apply heavily the first year the full dollar 
 
104 
 
 FERTILIZERS. 
 
 value you would use of stable manure, and in after-years 
 give a light dressing. The effect of ashes lasts two or 
 three times as long as stable manure. They are especially 
 valuable for fruit-trees, fruit, grass, onions, cabbage, melons, 
 cucumbers, and potatoes. A thorough application calls for 
 from 45 to 200 bushels per acre. 
 
 For Strawberries. — Apply, in early fall or before, 
 40 to 125 bushels per acre, spading in a little bone before 
 they start in the spring. 
 
 For Potatoes. — Scatter from 21 to 57 bushels a foot 
 wide over the drills after they are covered. 
 
 For Corn. — Harrow in 40 to 80 bushels per acre be- 
 fore planting ; and, after covering the seed, spread 15 to 
 28 bushels on the top of the hills, covering a strip a foot 
 wide. 
 
 For Lawns, Meadows, or Pastures. — In fall or 
 early spring, or soon after haying, spread from 25 to 125 
 bushels. If 125 are used, no more will be needed for sev- 
 eral years. 
 
 In Laying down to Grass. — Broadcast 45 to 225 
 bushels, in summer or fall, to give it time to leach down. 
 Next year plant with potatoes, top-dressing with from 12 
 to 18 bushels per acre. Next year sow to wheat or rye, 
 and lay down to grass. No more fertilizer needed for 
 eight or ten years, when the largest quantity is used. 
 
 For Wheat, Rye, and Oats. — Broadcast from 85 to 
 170 bushels in November, and plough slightly under. In 
 spring plough deeper, throwing it up to the surface, and 
 harrowing it ; or, for the immediate crop, 20 bushels may 
 be harrowed in, in the spring : but in the long run the 
 larger use will be the more profitable. 
 
 For Onions. — Broadcast from 45 to 250 bushels in the 
 fall, and plough them just under. In the spring plough 
 them back to the surface, and harrow. If 250 bushels are 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 105 
 
 used, 40 will do for the second year, 60 for the third, and 
 85 for the fourth. 
 
 For Cabbage and Cauliflower. — Use from 125 to 
 200 bushels in early spring, harrowing it into the ploughed 
 land. After the plants are four inches high, put half a 
 pint around each hill before hoeing. By such an applica 
 tion, cabbage can be raised several years in succession on 
 the same soil. Apply 40 bushels, broadcast, the second 
 year, 60 the third, and 85 the fourth ; using also some each 
 year in the hill. 
 
 For Cucumbers and Melons. — Harrow in 88 bush- 
 els, and scatter a pint over the top of each hill. 
 
 FERTILIZERS excellent for various crops, and sug- 
 gestions. 
 
 For Strawberries, Raspberries, Peaches, and 
 Pears, and the Fruit Garden and Orchard Gen- 
 erally. — There has been found nothing more satisfactory 
 than the phosphoric acid and potash, with but a small 
 quantity of nitrogen. Bone that has been treated with acid 
 will act at once, but coarse steamed bone is more enduring. 
 I have a pear-orchard in land that has naturally a good sup- 
 ply of potash, that, being in a sickly condition, I treated 
 to coarse steamed bone eight years ago, with the result 
 of producing a good growth of wood, and noble crops of 
 fruit, while I could cut two good crops under it annually 
 ever since. (See Mr. Hunt’s remarks, on p. 67, on the 
 advantage of the bone and potash application to such 
 fruits.) It appears to be settled that the “ yellows” on the 
 peach-trees is caused by want of nourishment, there being 
 especially a lacking of potash. Diseased trees have been 
 cured by a liberal application of it. 
 
 Professor Penhallow advises, after stirring the soil, to 
 apply per acre the following mixture, viz., sulphate of mag- 
 
106 
 
 FERTILIZERS. 
 
 nesia (hieresite), 25 pounds ; muriate of potash, 100 to 
 150 pounds; dissolved bone-black, 450 pounds: omitting a 
 space of a foot all about the tree. Instead of the muri- 
 ate, probably 10 bushels of unleached wood ashes, with a 
 peck of waste salt, might be used. Dr. Nichols recom- 
 mends the following as a good stock fertilizer, a good com- 
 bination for all crops, five hundred pounds to be applied 
 to the acre. While he considers superphosphates as good 
 for all crops, he considers them especially good for roots 
 and cereals. 
 
 Lbs. 
 
 Superphosphate of lime 40 
 
 Sulphate of ammonia ....... 25 
 
 Muriate of potash 25 
 
 Sulphate of lime (plaster) 7 
 
 Sulphate of magnesia 3 
 
 For Asparagus. — J. B. Moore, the well-known market 
 gardener, has an acre and a half of asparagus on soil nat- 
 urally very poor, mere pitch-pine land, which has, since 
 broken up from nature, received no other dressing than 
 phosphate of lime and potash. It is remarkably thrifty. 
 
 For Pasture-Land. — Raw ground bone will restore 
 to the soil the phosphate of lime that has been carried away 
 in the milk and in the bones of the young calf. Use finely 
 ground bone (not treated with acid) at the rate of four hun- 
 dred to five hundred pounds per acre, and the effects will 
 be seen for years. It is better to double the productive- 
 ness of a pasture than to double the area of it. 
 
 For Fruit-Trees in Pasture-Land. — To Professor 
 Maynard, of the Massachusetts Agricultural College, I be- 
 lieve the public will, as years go on, realize that they owe 
 a great debt. The professor was the first, as far as I am 
 aware, to agitate, and carry out in practice on some- 
 thing of a large scale, the idea of using for orcharding, 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 107 
 
 waste land, rocky pastures, and hillsides which neither 
 the plough nor manure cart could reach. This was made 
 practicable by the use of commercial fertilizers. The 
 professor’s plan is, in brief, to dig holes three or four, feet 
 across, throwing out the earth to the requisite depth, and 
 then, with picks, loosening the soil eighteen inches deeper 
 if practicable. Make a mixture of half bone, half potash, 
 and, when planting, scatter about four good handfuls over 
 the soil thrown out before planting, and as much more in 
 the holes when they are half filled up with earth. Mulch 
 with waste hay or tan. Apply the same amount of manur- 
 ing yearly for a few years, until the trees are well estab- 
 lished and in a thrifty condition. I have planted a hundred 
 or more trees in this way on my waste hilly pasture-land, 
 and am thus far pleased with their promise. 
 
 In Laying Land down to Grass. — Finely ground 
 bone harrowed in at the time of laying down, at the rate 
 of from five hundred to a thousand pounds to the acre, 
 will be found to be an excellent manure, and a lasting one. 
 If the bone is steamed, it can be used in a coarser state. If 
 the grass is light upland (such land is better for corn than 
 grass), then have half of the bone in the form of acid 
 phosphate. When wood ashes are accessible, test your 
 upland, and manure a portion with a mixture of the two, 
 using value for value of each, and be governed in the 
 future by the results. In bone and ashes we have a com- 
 plete manure, all of the three elements being present. 
 
 For Corn. — In the valuable experiments inaugurated 
 by the Connecticut experimental station, in the experi- 
 ments with barn manures and various fertilizers on corn, it 
 was found that the mixture of three hundred pounds of 
 superphosphate with one hundred and fifty pounds of 
 muriate of potash gave the greatest profit, though not the 
 largest crop ; the average yield in fifty-three experiments 
 
108 
 
 FERTILIZERS. 
 
 being a little over fifty bushels of shelled corn to the acre, 
 while the cost of the fertilizers was not over eight dollars. 
 A mixture of either fish or Lobos guano and muriate of pot- 
 ash has proved an excellent manure for large crops of corn. 
 Try it at the rate of five hundred pounds of either variety 
 of guano and one hundred and fifty pounds of the potash. 
 
 For Potatoes. — The summing-up of many experiments 
 made over a large area of country was, that the best 
 manure for potatoes is five hundred and fifty pounds of 
 Peruvian or fish guano, with one hundred and fifty 
 pound of muriate of potash. 
 
 For Cotton. — For cotton in sandy uplands, the fol- 
 lowing mixture is said by Professor Dabney to have given 
 excellent results : “ 20 bushels dry earth, 250 pounds kai- 
 nite, 400 pounds pure dissolved animal bone (or 600 pounds 
 acid phosphate), and 100 pounds sulphate of ammonia, well 
 mixed ; 500 to 1,000 pounds to the acre.” 
 
 For Wheat. — In using guano on wheat, it is recom- 
 mended to use one-third in the drills at time of sowing ; 
 one-third early in the spring, to be lightly harrowed in ; 
 and one-third just before a rain, when the plants are eight 
 or ten inches out of the soil. 
 
 For Grass or Grain Crop. — Where finely ground 
 bone only is used (we will remember there is no potash in 
 this), an application is recommended by good authority, to 
 vary with the condition of the soil, of from 600 to 1,200 
 pounds to the acre. The effect of this will be seen for 
 several years. 
 
 composts. 
 
 Our farmer friends in the South do more in making a 
 class of composts which in their composition and con- 
 centration approach commercial fertilizers, than do we of 
 the North. And this is not to be wondered at, when on 
 so many farms they have cotton-seed, so rich in am- 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 109 
 
 monia and phosphoric acid, while in a thickly wooded 
 region there must be plenty of ashes to supply potash, 
 and almost in their midst lie the great phosphate beds of 
 North and South Carolina and Georgia. We of the North, 
 with our coarser materials, such as night-soil, fish-waste, 
 sea manure, and the like, make composts, but not nearly 
 so rich, or approaching so near in character to the commer- 
 cial fertilizers in the market. Professor Dabney submits 
 four valuable compost formulas, which I here present : 
 
 Formula No. 1. 
 
 Stable manure 
 Cotton-seed . 
 Dissolved bone 
 
 Lbs. 
 
 800 
 
 750 
 
 450 
 
 2,000 
 
 He advises in substance as follows : Have barn manure 
 two inches deep, next the bone two inches, and then 
 cotton-seed four inches. Wet the mass well with urine if 
 possible, otherwise with water. Continue to repeat in 
 same order until all the material is used. Cover the heap 
 with dry earth or plaster. In from three to seven weeks 
 the fermentation will have killed the cotton-seed. When 
 using, pitch over, and mix thoroughly. 
 
 For Cotton. — For cotton, use 300 pounds per acre, 
 half in the furrow, and half with the seed. On poor soil, 
 use 400 to 500 pounds, — 150 pounds with the seed. 
 
 For Corn. — Use one pint to the hill. If the land is 
 in pretty good condition, use less. On sandy pine lands 
 or old fields, add 75 pounds per acre of muriate of potash. 
 When ashes are plenty, substitute these, — about 10 
 bushels unleached hard-wood. 
 
 For Winter Wheat. — Use 400 to 500 pounds per acre, 
 adding 50 pounds sulphate of potash dissolved in water. 
 If the season is backward, add in the spring 100 pounds 
 nitrate of soda. 
 
110 
 
 FERTILIZERS. 
 
 Formula No. 2. 
 
 Lbs. 
 
 Dry muck, peat, or soil 
 
 . 600 
 
 Cotton-seed (twenty-two bushels) .... 
 
 . 600 
 
 Acid phosphate ....... 
 
 . 600 
 
 Muriate of potash 
 
 . 100 
 
 Sulphate of ammonia ...... 
 
 . 100 
 
 
 2,000 
 
 Compost in same manner as No. 1 ; the muriate of potash 
 
 and sulphate of ammonia being dissolved in 
 used to wet the heap. 
 
 water, and 
 
 Foe Wheat, Rye, ok Oats. — Three hundred pounds 
 to the acre. It may be harrowed in with the grain. 
 
 Formula No. 3. 
 
 Lbs. 
 
 Stable manure 
 
 . 500 
 
 Unburnt marl ....... 
 
 . 500 
 
 Salt 
 
 . 200 
 
 Dissolved bones ....... 
 
 . 500 
 
 Sulphate of potash ...... 
 
 . 150 
 
 44 44 ammonia 
 
 . 150 
 
 Mix in layers, or first mixing the marl and salt together 
 thoroughly, and cover with it the compost of cotton-seed, 
 stable manure, and dissolved bone ; then sprinkle with the 
 solution of sulphate of ammonia, and turn the whole over 
 once in two weeks till fermented. Use as directed for Nos. 
 
 Formula No. 4, for Tobacco. Lbs. 
 
 Stable manure ........ 1,000 
 
 Sulphate of potash ....... 300 
 
 “ 44 ammonia 100 
 
 “ 44 magnesia 100 
 
 Dissolved bone 400 
 
 Land plaster . . . . . . . .100 
 
 2,000 
 
 Use 400 to 500 pounds to the acre. In place of the pot- 
 ash, 80 bushels of hard-wood ashes may be substituted. 
 Says the professor, “The formula for tobacco (No. 4) is 
 intended for those sections where cotton is not raised, and 
 has met with marked success.” 
 
AVERAGE COMPOSITION OF FERTILIZING MATERIALS: AMERICAN ANALYSES. 
 
 FERTILIZERS, 
 
 111 
 
 •anuoiqo 
 
 0.10 
 
 0.10 
 
 0.02 
 
 0.01 
 
 0.60 
 
 0.10 
 
 0.20 
 
 1.40 
 
 •ppy 
 
 ouoqclsoqj 
 
 OOO O © MOO ©O'*© © © © © © © © © © 
 
 lOiOOJ I , rHrH I OC005J , ©<N©rH , ^ ^ ^ 1 ^ ^ ^ 1 1 1 | © C5 © 
 
 © © d o © odd dodo d d © dr-id odd 
 
 •ppy 
 
 o p nqd[ng 
 
 0.10 
 
 6.70 
 
 0.20 
 
 0.50 
 
 0.50 
 
 4.10 
 
 0.60 
 
 0.04 
 
 1.40 
 
 0.10 
 
 I 
 
 4.20 
 
 0.70 
 
 41.90 
 
 47.80 
 
 •Bpog 
 
 0.1 
 
 0.3 
 
 0.1 
 
 0.3 
 
 0.2 
 
 0.2 
 
 1.0 
 
 0.4 
 
 7.8 
 
 0.4 
 
 0.6 
 
 0.6 
 
 29.6 
 
 1.0 
 
 •qsBpj 
 
 © © © ©© r* © -* ©©©© ©©©©©©© © © 
 
 | |C<j<N|©C<l©|OJrHrHCO| rH I- <N © t- 1 1 rf | | | © 
 
 odd dd ddd dodo r4 r-5 © ed © © -*' © cd 
 
 rH <N 
 
 •■BisauS^pt 
 
 0.3 
 
 0.6 
 
 0.6 
 
 0.5 
 
 0.3 
 
 11.0 
 
 0.1 
 
 0.1 
 
 4.9 
 
 3.0 
 
 4.2 
 
 3.1 
 
 2.9 
 
 2.2 
 
 0.7 
 
 •ararj 
 
 © © -* © CO 00 C5 © ■** ^ CO i-j »H QO © t- © 
 
 d'cddddr-i 1 1 'coded© 1 1 1 ddd 'ddd* 1 1 1 1 'id 
 
 © h* CO <N <N Hf © 
 
 •noJi 
 jo apixo 
 puB'eninitqY 
 
 t- <M '*•■*'*© '*'*»-! OOHOOtONiO 
 
 © 1 d rH i-i CO ' ' rH CO © d d rH id id CO © 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 
 
 •aiqrqosaj 
 
 pui3 ■Boqig 
 
 lC N a CO O « CC © © rH <N © r* QO CO CO rH © CO r* 05 © 
 
 © © Tji © ed -<* d 1 1 dbidriri 1 1 1 dr-idiidr-it-idcd 'ed'ed' 1 
 
 rH <M rH rH t— CO HHH<NiOHO 
 
 •uaSoa'jijst 
 
 ©COr*COCO<N<>}'*rH<M CO 00 CO <N © rH OOCOt-'*t^OO 
 
 doHOriddddd 'ohoohn 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 ddddoV 
 
 rH rH rH 
 
 •qsY 
 
 rH t-* t-j © CO 05 © CO rH © 05 QO OJ 00 
 
 cddriooddo* 1 ' 'dddridi.4 • • * 1 1 1 • l 1 1 * 1 • 1 
 
 H(N* IN1-H 1- 00 H rH 
 
 •J0WT8H 
 
 o i u v S .i o 
 
 ©COrH0OCOrHO5O5t'-© © 00 CO O] © Ol 
 
 ddddcdl-dridri 1 d -* d -* d d 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 
 
 <M © rH © 00 00 © 
 
 •aa^Al 
 
 71.30 
 
 58.00 
 
 32.20 
 
 76.20 
 21.40 
 
 13.00 
 
 53.50 
 
 3.80 
 
 19.50 
 4.40 
 
 32.70 
 
 7.80 
 
 14.00 
 30.80 
 
 50.20 
 
 7.80 
 
 31.50 
 
 18.00 
 
 5.20 
 2.70 
 
 8.20 
 
 1.80 
 6.00 
 
 16.00 
 
 10.10 
 
 15.70 
 
 g s-. 
 
 50 _ u 
 A ns 
 
 til 
 
 e 
 
 S - 
 
 ® §,o „ 
 
 \ gs I 
 
 3 n a w 
 
 g < 
 
 §3 
 
 • a | 
 
 : 1 1 
 
 L> ' 
 
 ” <a 
 
 3 S ?• 
 
 OB 'O 
 0> 0> , 
 
 43 ® j 
 
 . g 
 
 '5 
 
 a •«, 
 a 
 
 c a 
 
 := i u -- <X> ^ 
 
 « 2 o s! ai <B . 
 
 ^ 5 g ggjg Sl) w 1*T3 
 «oo2 • 
 
 £ « a 2 «£**■<» 
 ~ £ asL 
 
 sSS^^'^'cS~Eooa ! _ ! 'M 
 
 a ®*®-° ° S a *? 2 2 * s 
 
AVERAGE COMPOSITION OF FERTILIZING MATERIALS: AMERICAN ANALYSES. — Concluded. 
 
 112 
 
 FERTILIZERS, 
 
 •onuojqQ 
 
 © © © © © © 
 
 ii ii ii i 1 : i 
 
 © r-H © © t- 
 
 ^ MrlCI CO 
 
 I I I I I I I I I I I I 
 
 *PPV 
 ouoqdsoqj 
 
 © © © © © © © © 
 
 iO | CO OJ^t> QO © | | | | | | | | ‘G 
 
 to ricioOHOH © 
 
 ©©©©©©©©©©©© 
 
 l.-^i-JCOtDeOC^^OQOCJOIQO 
 
 r-HCOiO^t-COt^cicOoi©^* 
 
 NWMW«(NCIH(NN(M 
 
 •ppv 
 
 o i j nqdpig 
 
 © © © © © © © 
 
 l l l l | © | | | | io io © | t"- to 
 
 © ©HOO NO 
 
 © © © 
 
 i i i i i ^ ^ i i i 
 
 HM(N 
 
 •^pog 
 
 I I I I I . 
 
 I * [ft K ' ( 
 
 I I I I I I I I I I I I 
 
 •qsuioj 
 
 © ©© © ©©©©©©©© 
 
 CO I © © I Oj I I I M»OiOOHHiOCj 
 
 © rA c4 oi c4 © © CO CO CO CO © 
 
 iO T* CO CO t-I r* (M 
 
 I I I I I I I *® I I I es 
 
 •msonSirp^ 
 
 I I I I • o • I • * * I OQO * 
 
 ©co 1 © © 
 
 I ' ' » ' 
 
 •onirq 
 
 • i ' i i « i i i i i i « ^ i , 
 
 •uoji 
 
 jo opixo 
 
 pu^Baiainiv 
 
 i i i i i -c i i i i i i i i i i . 
 
 I * ' ' co i i i i ' <= i 
 
 aiqrqosaj 
 
 pi!12 120 pig 
 
 © 00 <M 
 
 11111*111 111*11 
 
 •ao^oaqj^ 
 
 i i i i i i x i i i . 
 
 •qsy 
 
 I l l I l .Q I l l 
 
 I I l I I I l , 
 
 l t l l l l l l I . 
 
 o iubSj o 
 
 i • • ' i ' 
 
 i i i i i i i . 
 
 i i i i i i i i 
 
 ©©©©©©©©r 
 
 •J01^ 
 
 © © © 
 
 1 l I 
 
 © © <N 
 
 sg§ 
 
 © I © | © w ^ I § © 
 
 ©' © © © r-5 ©fr^ ©*© 
 
 •8 - 
 
 . 'O - 
 
 ^ I 
 
 £ S 15 a 
 Jos 'O^oriu 
 
 »-K " OJ ci ? 3 5Q 
 
 O o a. ” a $ 
 
 s.s a ^ 
 
 ® 2^-^ o ^ o 
 
 gsmiwll 
 
 O .CJ K.T3 
 
 $ ,||1 
 
 £13 8- •* 
 
 ^ a 
 
 I * . 
 
 8 - 
 e*S °~ 
 
 00 ^ o 
 
 < c 3 js, „ 
 
 ,G ^’C or 
 •S5s 
 
 • ® -g OD 
 
 .aga fcs 
 ,2^f|g 
 
 ® gi 8 « 1 
 
 •s|l|l § 
 
 •rH QO -Q ^ G 
 
 c3 0^3 O 
 
 §*W 
 
 rv o 
 
 a ®.S S 
 
 Q. O i— i C3 
 
 O H H M 
 
 — d ®0 ° 
 
 ■“ l^s S 
 
 c 3 <3 cS 
 
 , c > 3 >*: 
 
 1 c 3 , 5 s o 3 
 
 O^aQOC 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 113 
 
 The table is very interesting and instructive, and will 
 bear a good deal of studying. Notice how many sub- 
 stances, in their percentages of nitrogen, potash, and phos- 
 phoric acid, approach in value stable manure. Notice that 
 the humus-making capacity (the organic matter) of dry 
 muck is three times as great as in stable manure. To 
 make the potash and lime in oyster-shells and mollusks 
 available for plant-food, they must be burnt. In marine 
 mud it is probably the nitrogen and alumina only that are 
 available ; the mineral matter, mostly fragments of shells, 
 being insoluble. As a rule, the per cent of organic matter 
 in the several substances is a measure of their humus-mak- 
 ing capacity. Note that all the substances that are the 
 product of combustion contain no nitrogen : combustion 
 destroys nitrogen. 
 
 Corn-cobs, as will be seen, are amazingly rich in potash ; 
 but the quantity of ashes from them is amazingly small. 
 The potash in the ashes from a bushel of cobs is worth a 
 little scant of one-third of a cent. Note that decayed vege- 
 table matter, in its various forms, is much the same in the 
 proportions of the three elements. 
 
 Let us bear in mind that the nitrogen in the different 
 substances varies greatly in its value, depending on its 
 availability : for instance, that in horn, hoof, and hair is 
 worth not over ten cents per pound, while that from blood, 
 castor-pomace, and cotton-seed meal is worth not far from 
 eighteen cents. Note that there is no potash in the lime 
 manures, phosphates, and phosphatic guanos. 
 
 The following table is copied from an excellent little 
 pamphlet on the cultivation of potatoes, issued by the 
 Mapes Formula Company, 158 Friend Street, New York. 
 It shows the value of the plant-food taken out of the soil 
 by various crops. It is very valuable to us farmers, by 
 enabling us to determine whether or not we are increas- 
 
114 
 
 FERTILIZERS. 
 
 mg the fertility of our soils. If the value of the phosphoric 
 acid, potash, and nitrogen in the plant-food we apply is 
 less than their value in the crop we take off, then we are 
 robbing our land, and running down our farms, and vice 
 versa . Take wheat, for an illustration. The value of these 
 three elements in both stock and grain taken from the soil 
 (assuming that one-half of the nitrogen is obtained from 
 the air) is 34 cents per bushel, or $8.50 in a crop of 
 twenty-five bushels. Now, whether we are improving or 
 robbing our land turns on the fact of our having put on 
 more or less than $8.50 in fertilizers, and in the proportion 
 indicated by the analysis. 
 
 ESTIMATES OF COST OF PLANT-FOOD IN CROPS. 
 
 The phosphoric acid and potash are figured at the full quantities contained in the 
 crops ; but the nitrogen is figured at one-half or less , assuming the balance to be fur- 
 nished by the soil and atmosphere, which is in accordance with the tendency of the 
 results of modern scientific investigation. 
 
 In practice, on many soils half-rations of potash are ample; but, in the case of the 
 phosphoric acid, its deficiency in nearly all soils calls for full rations to be supplied from 
 outside sources. 
 
 f One bushel wheat, 60 lbs. 
 
 The natural proportion of 
 straw . . . 150 lbs. 
 
 f One bushel barley, 48 lbs. 
 
 j The natural proportion of 
 ^ straw ... 67 lbs. 
 
 f One bushel rye.. 56 lbs. 
 
 J 
 
 I The natural proportion of 
 ^ straw . . . 118 lbs. 
 
 f One bushel oats, 32 lbs. 
 I 
 
 | The natural proportion of 
 [ strcvw ... 67 lbs. 
 
 f One bushel shelled corn, 
 56 lbs. 
 j 
 
 I The natural proportion of 
 L stover . . . 107 lbs. 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 Cents. 
 
 
 Nitrogen, 4 . . 
 
 0.625 lbs.@ 
 
 21,| c. 
 
 per lb., 
 
 13.28 ] 
 
 
 
 Phosphoric acid, 
 
 0.475 
 
 it 
 
 @ 
 
 9 
 
 4.26 
 
 ► 19 cts. 
 
 Potash .... 
 
 0.320 
 
 a 
 
 @ 
 
 41 
 
 H 
 
 1.36 J 
 
 
 
 Nitrogen . . . 
 
 0.360 
 
 a 
 
 @ 
 
 2lf 
 
 ii 
 
 7.65 ] 
 
 1 
 
 
 Phosphoric acid, 
 
 0.330 
 
 a 
 
 ® 
 
 9 
 
 if 
 
 2.97 
 
 ► 15 
 
 
 Potash .... 
 
 0.945 
 
 a 
 
 @ 
 
 rH 
 
 a 
 
 4.01 J 
 
 1 
 
 
 Nitrogen, | . . 
 
 0.458 
 
 a 
 
 & 
 
 
 9.56 1 
 
 ) 
 
 
 Phosphoric acid, 
 
 0.321 
 
 a 
 
 @ 
 
 9 
 
 
 2.88 
 
 > 13 
 
 (C 
 
 Potash .... 
 
 0.211 
 
 a 
 
 ® 
 
 to 
 
 
 0.89 ] 
 
 \ 
 
 
 Nitrogen . . . 
 
 0.104 
 
 a 
 
 ® 
 
 
 2.21 ] 
 
 1 
 
 
 Phosphoric acid, 
 
 0.180 
 
 << 
 
 ® 
 
 9 
 
 
 1.62 
 
 ' 7 
 
 « 
 
 Potash .... 
 
 0.860 
 
 a 
 
 ® 
 
 4 4 
 
 a 
 
 3.65 j 
 
 1 
 
 
 Nitrogen, b . . 
 
 0.500 
 
 a 
 
 ® 
 
 2lf 
 
 a 
 
 10.62 ] 
 
 ! 
 
 
 Phosphoric acid, 
 
 0.468 
 
 
 @ 
 
 9 
 
 
 4.21 
 
 . 16 
 
 
 Potash .... 
 
 0.312 
 
 a 
 
 @ 
 
 4* 
 
 a 
 
 1.36] 
 
 1 
 
 
 Nitrogen . . . 
 
 0.140 
 
 a 
 
 @ 
 
 21| 
 
 a 
 
 2.97 ] 
 
 ! 
 
 
 Phosphoric acid, 
 
 0.218 
 
 a 
 
 @ 
 
 9 
 
 a 
 
 1.96 
 
 . 9 
 
 “ 
 
 Potash .... 
 
 0.906 
 
 a 
 
 @ 
 
 4^ 
 
 2l| 
 
 a 
 
 3.62] 
 
 1 
 
 
 Nitrogen, 4 . . 
 
 0.306 
 
 a 
 
 @ 
 
 a 
 
 6.49 ] 
 
 1 
 
 
 Phosphoric acid, 
 
 0.200 
 
 a 
 
 @ 
 
 9 
 
 a 
 
 1.80 
 
 • 9 
 
 “ 
 
 Potash .... 
 
 0.140 
 
 a 
 
 @ 
 
 4* 
 
 2U 
 
 << 
 
 0.60 ) 
 
 1 
 
 
 Nitrogen . . . 
 
 0.186 
 
 a 
 
 @ 
 
 a 
 
 3.95 
 
 1 
 
 it 
 
 Phosphoric acid, 
 
 0.126 
 
 a 
 
 @ 
 
 9 
 
 a 
 
 1.13 
 
 . 8 
 
 Potash .... 
 
 0.593 
 
 a 
 
 @ 
 
 44 
 
 a 
 
 2.50 ) 
 
 1 
 
 
 Nitrogen, 4 . . 
 
 0.223 
 
 a 
 
 ® 
 
 214 
 
 a 
 
 4.73] 
 
 1 
 
 
 Phosphoric acid, 
 
 0.306 
 
 a 
 
 ® 
 
 9 
 
 a 
 
 H 5 
 
 ► 8 
 
 ti 
 
 Potash .... 
 
 0.186 
 
 it 
 
 @ 
 
 44 
 
 214 
 
 €i 
 
 0.79) 
 
 1 
 
 
 Nitrogen . . . 
 
 0.126 
 
 a 
 
 @ 
 
 it 
 
 2.67] 
 
 ' 14 
 
 
 Phosphoric acid, 
 
 0.406 
 
 a 
 
 @ 
 
 9- 
 
 it 
 
 3.65 
 
 K 
 
 Potash .... 
 
 1.773 
 
 a 
 
 
 44 
 
 it 
 
 7.50 ) 
 
 \ 
 
 
FERTILIZERS. 
 
 115 
 
 ( One bushel potatoes (tu- 
 I bers) .... 60 lbs. 
 
 f One bushel buckwheat, 
 48 lbs. 
 
 | The- natural proportion of 
 ( straw ... 67 lbs. 
 
 \ One bushel onions, 50 lbs. 
 
 f Dry-leaf tobacco, 100 lbs. 
 
 I The natural proportion of 
 ^ stalk .... 87 lbs. 
 
 I Seed cotton (334 lbs. lint), 
 f 1,000 lbs. 
 
 ] One ton meadow hay . . 
 
 | One bushel pease, 60 lbs. 
 One bushel beans, 62 lbs. 
 
 Nitrogen, \ 
 Phosphoric ; 
 Potash . . 
 Nitrogen, 1 
 Phosphoric : 
 Potash . . 
 
 Nitrogen . 
 Phosphoric ; 
 Potash . . 
 
 Nitrogen, \ 
 Phosphoric acid 
 Potash . 
 Nitrogen, 
 Phosphoric acic 
 Potash . . . 
 
 Nitrogen . . 
 
 Phosphoric a 
 Potash . . . 
 
 Nitrogen, 
 Phosphoric acic 
 Potash . . . 
 
 Nitrogen, £ . 
 Phosphoric ac 
 Potash . . . 
 Nitrogen, 
 Phosphoric ac 
 Potash . . . 
 
 Nitrogen, A 
 Phosphoric ac 
 Potash . . . 
 
 . 0.097 lbs. @ 211 c. 
 
 per 1 
 
 1 , 0.106 “ 
 
 & 9 
 
 ii 
 
 0.336 “ 
 
 @ 41 
 
 a 
 
 0.172 “ 
 
 @211 
 
 u 
 
 , 0.273 “ 
 
 @ 9 
 
 a 
 
 0.129 “ 
 
 © 41 
 
 
 0.216 “ 
 
 @ 211 
 
 
 , 0.406 “ 
 
 © 9 
 
 a 
 
 1.613 “ 
 
 © 41 
 
 ii 
 
 0.053 “ 
 
 @ 211 
 
 a 
 
 , 0.077 “ 
 
 @ 9 
 
 a 
 
 0.084 “ 
 
 © 41 
 
 a 
 
 1.944 “ 
 
 @211 
 
 a 
 
 , 0.595 “ 
 
 @ 9 
 
 a 
 
 5.634 “ 
 
 © 41 
 
 a 
 
 1.305 “ 
 
 @ 211 
 
 a 
 
 , 1.186 “ 
 
 @ 9 
 
 tt 
 
 3.717 “ 
 
 © 41 
 
 a 
 
 2.583 “ 
 
 @ 211 
 
 a 
 
 , 9.600 “ 
 
 @ 9 
 
 << 
 
 11.066 “ 
 
 © 4 1 
 
 a 
 
 16.000 “ 
 
 @ 211 
 
 a 
 
 , 8.200 “ 
 
 © 9 
 
 
 23.340 “ 
 
 © 4 1 
 
 u 
 
 0.179 “ 
 
 @211 
 
 a 
 
 , 0.512 “ 
 
 @ 9 
 
 a 
 
 0.588 “ 
 
 © 4 1 
 
 
 0.210 “ 
 
 @211 
 
 a 
 
 , 0.734 “ 
 
 @ 9 
 
 a 
 
 0.809 “ 
 
 @ 41 
 
 a 
 
 Cents, 
 lb., 2.06 ) 
 
 0.95 ( 4 cts. 
 1.32) 
 
 3.66 ) 
 
 2.45 ( 7 “ 
 0.54 ) 
 
 4.59 ) 
 
 3.65} 15 “ 
 6.85 ) 
 
 1.12 ) 
 
 0.69} 2 “ 
 0.35) 
 
 41.31 1 
 5.35 } 72 “ 
 23.94 ) 
 
 27.73 ) 
 
 10.67 } 54 “ 
 15.79 ) 
 
 54.88 ) 
 
 86.40 } $1.89 
 47.03 ) 
 
 3.18 ) 
 
 0.74 } $1.0311 
 99.19 ) 
 
 3.80 ) 
 
 4.50 } 11 cts. 
 2.49 ) 
 
 4.46) 
 
 6.60 } 14 “ 
 3.63) 
 
 A PLEA FOR MERCY. 
 
 Though repeatedly urged to write this treatise by the 
 Essex County Agricultural Society, I excused myself again 
 and again, not only from a feeling of lacking ability to do 
 the subject full justice, but also for the solid reason that it 
 would bring down on my defenceless head a shower of cor- 
 respondence asking advice and instruction on the many 
 questions which will arise in individual experience ; for, on 
 a subject so rich in its many phases, it would be impos- 
 sible to write a work that would anticipate all matter in 
 which its readers might like information. Now, it is the 
 most natural thing in the world that my good friends 
 should desire to ask these questions : I should were I in 
 their place. But if they will please turn about, and put 
 themselves in my place, and consider not only the time 
 that would be required to perform the mere manual labor 
 of answering such letters, but the thought and study that 
 
116 
 
 FERTILIZERS. 
 
 would be necessary to give intelligent replies, I have no 
 doubt but that they would unanimously concede to me the 
 right to put in this plea for mercy. I suppose the able men 
 at the head of our experimental stations will hardly thank 
 me ; but I would, sotto voce , suggest to my friends, that, if 
 questions must be asked, they switch the vast freight on to 
 their track, and^o send them to abler heads and freer hands 
 than mine, — to those whose business it is to make such 
 investigations as would supply the facts needed in the an- 
 swering of this class of questions. Such as I may receive, I 
 propose to pigeon-hole until some future time, when I may 
 get out a book on barn manure and the various wastes 
 used as manures (in which, living near great manufactur- 
 ing centres, I have chanced to have a large experience), 
 and, either in the body of such treatise or m its closing 
 chapters, reply to my correspondents. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Introduction ' 1 
 
 Difference between Bam Manure and Commercial Fertilizers ... 6 
 
 What is Barnyard Manure ? 8 
 
 Humus . . • 12 
 
 Are Fertilizers but Stimulants ? 13 
 
 Potash 16 
 
 Wood Ashes 23 
 
 Coal Ashes 29 
 
 Cotton-Seed Hulls * . . . 29 
 
 The Uses of Potash in Agriculture 30 
 
 What is Nitrogen ? 34 
 
 Where Nitrogen or Ammonia comes from 35 
 
 How to Hahdle Fish-Waste, and the Best Way to Feed it to the Crops, 40 
 
 Other Sources for Nitrogen 44 
 
 Phosphoric Acid 54 
 
 Bones, and where they come from 57 
 
 Making our own Superphosphate 58 
 
 Reduction of Unground Bone 64 
 
 The Theories of Fertilizing 68 
 
 Testing our Soils 72 
 
 A Faith that is Dangerous ; Buying Cheap Fertilizers 74 
 
 Making our own Fertilizers 77 
 
 The Manufacturers of Fertilizers 78 
 
 Leather-Waste 79 
 
 Some Facts and Suggestions 81 
 
 Fertilizing Ingredients in Raw Materials and Chemicals 84 
 
 Commercial and Agricultural Values of Fertilizers 86 
 
 Where to Obtain our Fertilizing Material at the Lowest Cost ... 86 
 
 Formulas, and how to Compound them 90 
 
 Formulas for Various Crops 91 
 
 How to Compound our own Formulas . 94 
 
 Some Formulas as Compounded 96 
 
 Condensation of Special and other Formulas 98 
 
 How to Mix the Ingredients that enter into a Formula 101 
 
 Applying Fertilizers . 102 
 
 The System of Manuring with Unleached Wood Ashes 103 
 
 Fertilizers Excellent for Various Crops, and Suggestions .... 105 
 
 Composts 108 
 
 American Analyses of Composition of Fertilizing Materials . . Ill, 112 
 
 Estimates of Cost of Plant-Food in Crops 114 
 
 A Plea for Mercy 115 
 
AGRICULTURAL TREATISES 
 
 WRITTEN BY J. J. H. GREGORY, MARBLEHEAD, MASS, 
 
 SEED-GROWER AND SEED-DEALER. 
 
 , ' i 
 
 *** Single copies of either of the four following treatises sent by mail for 30 cents , 
 or the four for $1. Seed-dealers and book-sellers supplied at the usual discount. 
 
 ONION-RAISING : 
 
 WHAT KINDS TO RAISE, AND THE WAY TO RAISE THEM. 
 
 This work has gone through fifteen editions. It treats on onions raised 
 from seed, potato onions, onion-sets, top onions, shallots, and rareripes; 
 the onion maggot; rust; the merits of the different varieties of onions; 
 instructions in seed-raising, and how to tell good seed, beginning with 
 the selecting of thq ground, and carrying the reader along, step by step, 
 through the preparing of the soil, manuring, ploughing, planting, hoeing, 
 weeding, gathering the crop, storing and marketing it, with a hundred 
 minute details, embracing every department of the subject. Illustrated 
 with thirteen engravings of onions, sowing-machines, and weeding- 
 machines. 
 
 SQUASHES, AND HOW TO GROW THEM. 
 
 This treatise contains several illustrations, including a section of my 
 squash-house, with full directions for erecting one. In plan it is very minute 
 and thorough. Beginning with the selection of soil, it treats of the best 
 way of preparing it; the best manures, and the way to apply them; plant- 
 ing the seed; protecting the vines from bugs and maggots; the cultivation, 
 gathering, storing, and marketing of the crops, — giving hundreds of 
 minute details so valuable to inexperienced cultivators. 
 
 CABBAGES, AND HOW TO RAISE THEM. 
 
 This treatise begins with the selecting of the ground, and carries the 
 reader along, step by step, through the preparing of the soil, manuring, 
 ploughing, planting, hoeing, weeding, gathering the crop, storing and mar- 
 keting it, with a hundred minute details, embracing every department of 
 the subject. 
 
 To prepare myself the more thoroughly to write on this work, I experi- 
 mented on foreign and native varieties of cabbage for four years, raising 
 not far from seventy kinds. It is illustrated by several fine engravings. 
 I have added a paragraph on the green worm, that is causing so much 
 trouble in some localities. 
 
 CARROTS, MANGOLD WURTZELS, AND SUGAR 
 BEETS : 
 
 WHAT KINDS TO RAISE, HOW TO GROW THEM, AND HOW 
 TO FEED THEM. 
 
 In writing this treatise, I have endeavored to give that minuteness of 
 detail in every step of progress, from the seed to the matured crop, that is 
 generally desired by the public. While this work is more particularly 
 intended for persons of limited experience, yet it gathers up so much of 
 experience and observation, covering so much ground in the growing and 
 handling of these two standard crops, that I should be disappointed if 
 about ev-ery growei did not find within its covers some facts of more value 
 to him than "the cost of the book,... 
 

 .'JflSANA 
 
 *£ 11*069215892