The aegis & intelligencer. [volume] (Bel Air, Md.) 1864-1923, 1874-02-06

| Great mistakes are sometimes made by
the use OF nitrate Of soda alone on poor
lands as top-dressing. 1t contains very
few clements OF manure, therefore the in
tensely green and improved color of the
crop is delusive, which l have observed, and
this is also the opinion of Baron Liebig.
l much prefer and always use the best Pc
ruvian guano, mixed we'll with its own
weight OF common salt, for in this mixture
you have nearly all the elements of plants.
excepting potash and silica. A Compare
tive trial in the same field will give satis.
factory evidence when the crop is harvest
ed. With nitrate of soda the growth of
straw is forced, and it is often mildewed.
There are cases where nitrate of soda ia
advantageous, such us on soils Astounding
in phosphate Of lime or other fertile ele-
ments.
Common salt have used much the last
twenty-five years, and am convinced of its
advantages on drained and we'll farmed
land, especially on light land; for where
salt is used the moisture of the air will be
more abundantly appropriated and retain
ed. About five o'clock one fine summers
morning, | noticed that where the salt had
been sown the previous day, every grain of
salt had attracted to itself the dew, and
formed on the surface of the ground wet
spot about the size of sixpence, the ground
being generally very dry. On our light
lands it consoldates them, and makes
them especially firm and acceptable to the
wheat plant, whose straw will stand firm
and erect, although p to feet long. 1t
is also uniayorable to certain weeds by
this consideration. 1t prevents the raw
ages of wire worm. 1t is especially favor
able to saline plants, such as manpold.
whose ashes contain fifty per cent. of salt
never SOW Suano, except when mixed
with its own weight of salt. Like every
thing else, it has am sorry to say, greatly
risen i'll price. l observe that ali crops
seem to thrive well on land near salt wa
ter, especially where the land is drained.
Jumps ofrock salt should always be pac-
ed in managers for horses or cattle; their
instinct teaches them when to avail of it.
The spring consolidation Of light land,
where wheat is sown, by sailing and heavy
cross-killing, greatly benefits the crop
very light hand-hoeing should follow these
operations, although frequently hoeing is
scarcely required. Liebig, in his Natural
Laws of Husbandry," p. 1886, correctly des
cribes nitrate of soda and common salt az
chemical means for preparing the soil"-
Referring to the experiments, he says (p.
$50: "ln both these series of experiments,
the crops of corn and straw were remarka-
bly, increased by the addition of common
salt; and it is scarcely necessary to repeat
that such an augmentation could not pos
sibly have taken place unless the soil had
contained certain quantity of phosphoric
acid, silicic acid, potash, ETC., capable of
being brought into operation, but which.
without common salt, was not assimilable."
Liebig also says Up. S40); "The grass of
meadow which has been MANFRED with
common salt, is eaten by cattle with great
er relish, and preferred to any other so
that even from this point of view common
salt deserves attention as manure."-Cor.
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