The Middlebury register. [volume] (Middlebury, Vt.) 1850-1882, 1877-07-20
PIIOSPHATES.

gle dealer has sold twenty tons OF SUPER
phosphate, being double the quantity he
had ever sold in season before. This
shows the strong desire and need among
our farmers for more manure in order
TO grow paving crops. Yet no one con-
versant with the management (or mis-
management of homemade manure
prevalent among New England farm
ers, can doubt that ten times more phos-
phoric acid is wasted by the loss of urine
from stabbed stock than is bought at the
stores. This thriftlessness is almost
universal. We know lots of men that
grudge two dollars year for agricultu-
raj reading, who waste more than a
hundred dollars annually by the loss Of
their liquid manure.
Yet our farmers are not naturally
wasteful men. These same individuals
would be alert enough to keep rats out
ola corncrib or cows out of the moving.
The loss of half as much moneys worth
in either of these ways would give them
the blues for month, and make them
feel as though they certainly could not
take an agricultural paper next year.
The truth Is, they don't believe that
the loss Is much, if anything, from the
way in which they manage their ma
nure. If the chemist tells the dairyman
with thirty cows that more phosphorlc
acid Ito say nothing of other fertilizing
ingredients) is lost from his constable
every week than is contained in bar
rel of superphosphate which costs him
as much as barrel of -four, he Just docs
not believe it. You cannot make him
believe it. A certain preacher once
said to his congregation that if they be-
lieved in hell as they believed in the
fire that burned in the furnace which
was warming the church, they would
no more disregard known law of God
than they would thrust hand into that
furnace. And we know that if our
farmers really believed they were losing
thirty cents q week per COW by the
waste Of phosphates and nitrates in the
urine, something would be done about
it, and that quickly.
But a few do believe, and act ON that
belief; and their crops soon furnish
ample confirmation of their faith. There
are few farms in Vermont that cannot
be made visibly to gain in fertility from
year to year where all the manure that
Is made on the farm is applied to the
farm, with skill and judgment. We do
not say that it never will pay for
farmer to buy artificial fertilizers. But
we do say farmer knows too little Of
his trade when he takes the money that
ought to be used to fix his stables so as
to save all the manure, and spends it
for phosphate at the stores. Believe it
OF not, there is much more phosphoric
acid and amonia in the urine of COW
for one winter than was ever in any
barrel of superphosphate sold in Am
erica.
We say i'll America, and we might
truly say in the world, yet American
superphosphates are far inferior in quail
ity, and higher in prices, than those
made in Europe, where the landowners
are educated in science, and are able to
insist on having a first-class article at a
fair price.
Dr. Crozier, Of Boston, writing in the
Country Gentleman, states the facts
when he says that the (American) COM
mercial superphosphates contain only
BILE and reduced phosphoric acid, while
the chemically pure bi-phosphate of
lime contains a little over sixty per
cent. of wholly soluble phosphoric acid.
And this pure phosphate is now prepar-
ed for farmers use in England by n
process so cheap that it is actually sold
for less, by the ton or barrel, than the
much inferior American superphos-
pilates. Besides this, as one barrel con-
tains the strength of four of the Ameri-
can, the freight is only one-fourth for
the same quality. This pure super
phosphate is as handsome and free from
odor as ground plaster. But the very
fact that it does not stink would prevent
its sale with many, who believe that the
virtue both of manures and medicines
is in proportion to their nastiness, Yet
even if we could get such good and
cheap superphosphates as this, no one
could afford to buy them until the waste
of the stables is stopped. Not farmer
in Vermont is rich enough to waste a
dollar per COW yearly in this way. Let
him save ten dollars year in manures,
spend it for good agricultural reading,
and apply what he learns with judg-
ment, and we will guarantee him better
than compound interest on the saving.
But it is sad fact that our "farmers'
colleges" the common schools, are so
defective in their instruction that most
farmers cannot "make head nor tail' Of
the plainest matters of science; and this
is probably one reason why they spend
so little money for books and papers
that treat Of the science Of their own
art.
! Besides the economy Of stable ma
nure, both liquid and solid, there is a
considerable source of phosphate ma
nure, almost entirely neglected, i'll the
bones which might be collected and
saved in every neignborhood. The
chief, if not the entire value Of an eight
dollar barrel of superphosphate lies in
the one hundred and twenty-five pounds
of bone it contains, or ought to contain.
Now for eight dollars we can get the
boys to pick up from eight to twelve
hundred pounds of bones. They will
find out where the dead horses were
buried, dig them up and make dollar
by ali hours labor. They will CLEAN
, the fields, and rob the dogs, and will
pile up ton of bones in week in any
farmers yard who will encourage them
to do so. Take this pile of bones, with
little waste wood, and you can burn
! them till they are so brittle that they
f can be powdered with the back of a
, shovel. This powder is almost pure
t phosphate of lime, and ton of it
4 made by burning two tons of raw bones
: need not cost over forty dollars, while
f 1t contains more phosphoric acid than
four tons of any superphosphate ever
sold in Vermont. Scatter it over your
. manure, peck at time, and ton Of
4 it so used will double the phosphoric
3 value of all the manure for winter
t from herd of fifteen COWS.
S Another cheap way to increase the
q prosphoric acid Of our manure, as vel
q as the nitrogen, is the feeding of bran
0 or shorts. A ton of bran is worth
s fifteen dollars for the fertilizing mate
L rial it contains. 1t is also worth wha
: it usually costs for feed alone, so tina
d fifteen dollars may be made on every
e ton purchased. After doing thest
d things you will not feel the need o
= buying phosphates, except, perhaps
a for application to some pastures upor