Smyrna times., 1892-02-10
ABOUT WHEAT GROWING.
A LARGE CROP OF WHEAT WITHOUT
APPLIED NITROGEN.

We copy from the Baltimore weekly
Sun an article from the pen of A. p.
Sharp, in which it will be seon that the
eminent experimenter, Sir John b
Lawes, thinks the expensive artificial
nitrogen is not necessary to secure
large crops with proper tillage
Nothing is more important to far
mers than the improvement of their
land and the cheapest way of doing it.
The manufacturers of fertilizers from
one end of the country to another,
claim that high grade phOsphates
should be employed to do this. This
means a heavy dose of some organic
matter that will develop ammonia in
its resolution into elementary bodies,
/. e., carbOnic acid, water and am
mOnia, the nitrogen of which is valued
at from $400 to 5000 a ton. Nitrogen
is one of the most abundant elements
known to man, and movable in its
nature. 1t is found everywhere, from
the highest mountain to the lowest
valley and deepest cave. | presume
wherever the English language is
spoken, no one is better known as a
great agricultural experimenter than
Sir John B. Hayes, of ROthamstead,
England, who has devoted much labor
and vast sums of his great wealth in
endeavOring to show what is best for
the farmer. Some years ago, claimed
that the artificial application of nitro
gen in any form was unnecessary to
restore worn out lands. What is i'm
pOrtant and necessary, is a proper
supply of carbOnaceOus matter and
a porous soil that will absorb and hold
ammonia for future use My theory
was Immediately denounced by one OF
! two prominent writers as frank heresy
unwarranted by the facts and far
mers were warned not to be deceived
| by what had the air of science about it,
In this article | repeat what Sir John
b. Lawes states to me in recent letter.
He gives an account of experiments
carried on for nearly forty years on an
ordinary fsl I, with rotation of tur-
nips, barley, clover and beans once in
four years, and without a particle of
nitrogen. TO the turnips every fourth
year, superphosphates of lime and
some sulphate of potash, soda and
magnesia were applied. Last harvest
! the eleventh crop of wheat was secured
and the yield was over fifty bushels
per acre. Therefore, he says, large
crops of wheat can be grown without
applied nitrogen During the expert
ment he says at least 800 pounds of
nitrogen was removed from each acre.
A few weeks ago listened with
much interest at a chemical meeting
in Washington to a lecture delivered
by Prof. Warrington, who has been
connected for twenty years with the
experiment station of Sir John B.
LaWes. In this lecture he alluded to
the great loss of nitrogen through their
drain tiles. With this great loss and
the lUss of the 1900 pounds through
the crops, surely there must be some
natural, Ost unknown supply of nitro
gen. The waste by drainage is per
fsctly natural, for if there was not such
a supply, where would the animal life
of the ocean obtain the immense sup
ply necessary to sustain the animals of
the sea These marine animals are
richer in nitrogen than land animals
The drainage that Prof. Warrington
spoke of is the source of nitrogen for
animals, as it was for his fifty bushels
of wheat and the barley, turnip and
bean crop for forty years, and believe
for the next f)rty years, provided the
immOyable elements are kept supplied
and the proper rotation of crops is kept
observed. For twenty years l have
carefully watched the improvement OF
worn. out land without applied nitrogen
and during that time have removed
hundreds of tons of hay, corn oats and
wheat, and yet have seen a steady i'm
prOvement in the land that few years
before would not grow five bushels OF
corn, yield now fifty bushels of wheat
per acre, Though the land before
Improvement would not sprOut timothy
seed, IL now produces one to two tons
of the best hay, and am confident the
same can be done with thousands Oi
acres of Maryland land that are now
hardly worth the trouble of tilling.
1t can be done without a pound oi
applied nitrogen or high-grade ammo
mated phosphate. Such an improve
ment could not be accomplished in 8
season, but a good start can be obtain
ed by turning under growth
of corn or hlack-eye beans. But any
, seed will answer the same purpose anC
set in motion the chemistry of carbon
. "The turned in vegetable matter
} develops carbonaoeOus aoids, such a.
. must exist in fertile soil, as well a
carbon itself, giving the sand and ella!
q dark. heat and mOisture-absOrbinj