The progressive farmer. [volume] (Winston, N.C.) 1886-1904, 1888-03-06

pOGoou, 1IuIC, AAsSo1Ool0, AAoAi, PAOS
phoric acid, sulphuric acid, chlorine
and some compound of nitrogen.
Plants also take silica, soda and some
other materials from the soil, but
these are needed only in minute guam
titles or not at all. ...r,...
3. In removing crops from the soil
we take away plant food. This is the
chief cause of soil exhaustion Lack
of fertility is commonly due, in large
part or entirely, to lack of plant food.
4. Soils vary greatly in the capa-
bilities of supplying food to crops.
Different ingredients are deficient in
different soils. The chief lack of one
may be potash, of another phosphoric
acid, of another several ingredients,
and so on.
5. Soils fail to furnish enough food
for crops, not so much that they have
not abundant stores, as because the
materials are not in available forms.
A soil may have thousands of pounds
of phosphoric acid within reach of the
plants, but locked up in fragments Of
rock so that the roots cannot absorb
it, and then the crop will fail for lack
of phosphoric acid. .--f 4
6. The infertility of many soils is
due more to their mechanical con-
dition, their texture, and relations to
heat and moisture, than to- lack of
plant food. Such soils want amend
ment first and manures afterwards.
Some soils will give good returns for
manuring; others, without irrigation
or amendment by draining, tillage,
use of lime, mari or muck, Or other
wise, will not. =
7. The chief use of fertilizers is to
supply plant food which crops need
and soils fail to furnish. NJ j.
8. But the indirect action of fertili-
zers in improving the mechanical con-
dition Of the soil and rendering its
stores of plant food available is often
very important. Hence, cheap ma
terials, like bone and plaster, are fire.
quently more profitable than manure
or artificial fertilizers.
9. Plants vary greatly with respect
bilities of gathering the ingredients
from soil and air, and the effects of
different fertilizers upon their growth.
Hence the proper fertilizer in given
case depends upon the crop as well as
upon the soil.
10. The only ingredients of plant
food which we need to consider in
commercial fertilizers are potash, lime,
magnesia, phosphoric acid, sulphuric
acid and nitrogen. OF this list, mag
nesia is generally abundant, even in
"worn out" soils. Sulphuric acid
and lime are more often deficient, and
hence one reason Of the good effect SO
often observed from the application of
lime and plaster The remaining sub.
stances, the phosphoric acid, nitrogen
and potash, are the most important
ingredients of our commercial fertili
zers, because of both their scarcity in
the soil and their high cost.
IL. The chief use of commercial
fertilizers, guano, phosphates, bone,
potash, salts and special fertilizers pre-
pared by formula for different crops
is to supply nitrogen, phosphoric acid
and potash. afs.
IL. These materials are expensive,
but the right ones in the right places
are nevertheless very profitable. But
the same fertilizer in other cases may
bring little or no return. '''" -
l3. 1t is not good economy to pay
high prices for materials which our
soils themselves may furnish, but it is
good economy to supply the lacking
ones in the cheapest way. Farmers
cannot afford to use commercial fer
tilizers at random. No more can they
afford to have their crops fail when a
small outlay for the proper fertilizers
would bring a bountiful harvest. And
it is time that they understood these
facts, the reasons, and how to make |
use of them. a. naa .te = ast 20 /
IA. The only way to find what our
soils want is to study them by careful
observation and experiments. Sue !
cess in farming, as in other business,
requires the use of brains srsp |
Prof. Atwater stated, as illustrating
these fundamental principles, that
near Middletown there is farm on
which phosphate and nitrogen have
very little effect, while potash is very