St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1889-11-22

near the SeaShores, where the air and
rain are perceptibly saline.
AS vegetables contain salt, 1t is quite
reasonable to suppose that the animals
which feed upon vegetable food should
also contain salt. This is the fact, and
the fluid and solid parts of all animals
contain this substance. The solid part of
blood is nearly one-half salt (54.76 per
cent?, and it is curious fact that the
blood Of female animals has One-fOurth
more salt in it than of male animals;
this is probably due to their necessary
large secretion of milk, which contains
sometimes so much salt as to be per-
ceptibly saline to the taste, and has al
ways a considerable quantity of it.
The necessity for supplying. milking
animals with salt is thus ex-
planned. The whole body Of an
animal weighing 1000 pounds con-
tains about twenty-eight ounces of salt.
Then, if the true basis of all feeding of
plants and animals consist in furnish
ing to them every element they require
for healthful and perfect growth, salt
has an undOubted value, both as a fer
tiliZer for the soil and food .f.r plants,
as well as for food for animals.
In practice this deduction from the
facts given has been fully cOrroborated.
In some instances the r. has been failure
to perceive any beneficial results from
the use of salt as manure. but this fail
ure may be easily accounted for. The
small quantity of one grain of salt for
pound of dry soil would amount to 500
pounds per acre one foot deep, and this
comparatively large quantity might ex-
lst In the soil and yet the plant not take
up sufficient for its needs for want OF
wet season the solution would be too
weak to supply the necessities of the
plant. Again, there may be an album
dance of salt in The soil, as in the
coast-land farms, but there may be
without which the plant could
not acquire vigor or energy
enough to take up usefully the salt
which might have been available. All
these condi1i ms may and do often pre-
vail in regard to the use of other fertil-
iZers, and would necessarily affect the
use of the salt. But these negative in
stances have been very few, and in it
the great majority of cases the use of
salt upon all crops, but mostly upon
grass, oats and root crops, has been
found beneficial.
But salt has indirect as well as direct
action upon plants. One of its effects
upon the soil is to decOmpOse SilIcates,
and,a the elements of fertility are COM
bined largely with silica in these forms.
this effect is of much value. A remark
able result of applications of salt to fall
wheat has appeared ON rich land where
the lodgings of the wheat has been prd-
vented by the greater stiffness of tile
straw due to the increased supply of
soluble silica. Another good result of
salt upon wheat is its effect upon the
grain. producing a clear, bright, thin
bran which increased the market value
of the grain. Its effect upon root crops
is very marked, and the application of
300 or 600 pounds per acre. to mangels.
especially, is common practice among
successful root growers.
1t is also useful as an Insecticide. 1t
destroys the Hessian fly when sown
upon the young grain in the fall while it
is wet with dew in early morning. The
dew dissolves it and the solution falls
down into the base of the leaves and the
stem where the maggot is sapping the
life of the plant. The same good result
might most probably be effected in the
destruction of the onion maggOt, which
could be reached easily in this way.
Largely employed in the summer or 1all
fallOw, it kills cut worms, wire worms.
and the spores of injurious fungi. A
strong solution of it is used with good eff
feet in killing the spores of the smut of
wheat and other grains and thus pre-
pairing them for SOWING, and those OF
the rot of potatoes in the cuttings made
for planting. AS continent for ami
mails its use is universal. and a regular
supply of it should never be neglected,
especially when the need of it is under
stood,