The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1899-11-14
VALUE OF COTTON SEED.
A Correspondent Takes Issue With
Prof Irby's View
Nrom the Farmer and Mechanic.l

tEr0m the arlnef anu letHdlllc.)
To the Editor In your issue of No
vember ) there is an article from the
correspondence of the Progressive Farm
err, written by Editor b. Irby, in reply
to an inquiry from ]. NJ. Il. relative tc
the ACCESSIBILITY of exchanging cotton
seed for meal and hulls.
Mr.. Irby wrote this article to give, as
he thought, wholesome advice to the
farmers, and while l want to correct
some errors in his ideas and deductions,
| am not writing in any spirit Of con-
troversy and | take it that il Mr.. ir!y
can see that he is mistaken he viii up
preciate it and take it in good spirit.
His article, however good his intan-
tions.a does injustice both to farmers
and the mills.
The seed are only good TO FARMERS in
two ways-as a cattle food AID as
fertilizer. Mr. Irby says, as Il food, The
ton of seed is worth $10-incr sasing the
yield of beef or milk and the manure
from such food is worth 81. as 4 mat
ter Of fact the raw seed are nearly
worthless as a food, because YOU cannon
give the cattle enough of them ~ more
than barely sustain life without injuring
the digestion. You cannot increase Tie
yield of beef or milk at all al YOU can
do is to keep them alive. More OF the
seed would injure the cattle. The seed
arc too oily for a fattemng or milk yiel.
ing food Thus as a cattle food he raw
seed is a failure, and the manure there
from which Mr.. Irby puts ut S1.uD per
ton of seed is worth little if any more
than half this If Mr. Irby will con
suit any dairy or cattle-raising farmer
he will find this estimate of the raw seed
as a food about correct, so We can elm
mate the food value from c)ns'dcrl-
in estimating the worth of seed to the
farmer and come to that as a fertili-
yer.
| can agree with most of Mr.. Irby's
ideas in regard to the fertilizing quail
ties of seed. He. does not go quite far
enough in his proppsition. He says the
oil is of no account as a fertilizing prop
erty He could have gone further and
stated that it is a positive harm in that
the nitrogen and other plant food pres
ent in the seed are so held in an oily
mixture as to delay the action on the
plant to such a degree as to interfere
with the proper application, thus causing
partial waste in the plant food. The raw
seed cannot be so conveniently or advan-
tageously used as the meal cannot be
applied to the plant with the same GER
tainty and satisfaction as the meal
cannot be mixed with the soil or manipu-
lated with other ingredients with any
satisfaction at all.
So much for the value of the whole
seed to the farmers. Now if convenient
to haul to the mill land the hauling is
done when the team would otherwise he
idle 1.-THE farmer can exchange his seed
for meal and hulls, and he gains as
follows:
Whereas the seed are worthless as
a cattle food on account of the presence
Of the oil; when this is extracted we have
the best cattle food that has yet been
found. Cotton seed meal and hulls to
the value of so from a ton of seed (Mr.
Irby's fgures) will increase the yield OF
beef or milk the full SO Jas Mr. Irby
said the seed would do) and will give
more manure than the seed would give,
so as a food the farmer makes a clear
gain of so i'll the exchange Further
tudu lHlS lne meal 1nat the farmer
gets-the $50 pounds that Mr.. Irby says
is in ton Of represents 80 to 80
per cent. of the whole fertilizer and i'll
addition the farmer gets the hulls for
his stock, and the hulls alone are worth
more than the whole ton of seed for
food. / say the meal, $50 pounds rep
resent 80 per cent. of all the fertilizer i'm
the seed. If the waste of plant food in
cident to the use of the seed and the
extra availability of the meal be con-
sidered / suppose the 750 pounds OF
meal would represent full 100 per cent.
or the full equivalent of the whole ton
of seed as a fertilizer. Again, if a
farmer does not need his hulls he can
get 200 or 300 pounds more meal for
his ton of seed than the seed contains.
A great many mills give ! 900 pounds of
meal for 1000 pounds of seed The
farmer thus gets 81 per cent. or 40 per
cent. more fertilizer than his seed con-
talns, and in a far more serviceable,
convenient form. Certainly it pays him
to exchange. See how pleased those
farmers are who live near mill ut the
convenience of ayphou0n and how much