The progressive farmer. [volume] (Winston, N.C.) 1886-1904, 1900-09-11


they will say at once, "Ah this is a
good strong fertilizer and is bound
to make the crops grow, I will get
some.of it," q suppose they go on
the principle that if such terrible
odor is put in the ground with the
seed the plant will grow as hard as
it can to get out of such unpleasant
company. Unfortunately, however,
seeds and plants have no noses.
The farmers forget entirely that
a very small amount of some sub
stances produce a tremendous amount
of odOr, and that for cents a fertili-
zer factory could get enough per
| fumery to make a ton of sand or
dirt smell so bad that you could
hardly come within 100 feet of it.
Still that material would be of no
benefit to the soil.
4th. Price. Many farmers think
a fertilizer is fertilizer, and that it
makes no difference what fertilizer
Is used. They think, or have been
told, that they should SOW fertilizer,
and to them all fertilizer is the same,
so they get the cheapest they can,
without a thought as to what it con-
tains or as to the amount of the fer
tilizing ingredients. A lot of dirt
with bad odor thrown in, branded
as fertilizer, at low price, would be
more readily bought by them than
the highest grade goods at price
few dollars higher.
/ have not attempted to bring for
ward any proofs of the above facts,
as think all here will accept them
as facts, and all, 1 am certain, are
agreed that most farmers are guided
in their purchase of fertilizers by
other reasons than their guaranteed
composition, or by no reason at all.
Now the question is: How is he to
be gotten to buy them on correct
principles? By education, of course !;
but how is he to be educated? will
suggest the following methods,
which are not exclusive, but each
helps the other:
1st. Farmers Institutes.
End Fertilizer Bulletins.
3rd. Farmers Reading Courses.
1st. Farmers Institutes. We all
recognize the value of Farmers In
stitutes. We also know that they
are not as good as they should be or
as they can be made. The faults we
are all striving to correct as fast as
we can and make them of more value.
But think at every Institute the
subject of fertilizers should have g
more prominent place, and the fact
should be impressed on the farmers
that fertilizers are for the purpose
| of making crops grow; that phos-
phoric acid, nitrogen and potash are
the ingredients which do that, and
that these ingredients are put in the
ground with the seed and feed the
growing plant and make it grow
faster while the name remains on
the. bag or piece of paper, and so far
as the crop lis concerned, might as
we'll have never existed.
2nd., Fertilizer Bulletins. Our fer
tilizer bulletins, I think, can be i'm
proved upon as a means of educating
the farmer. All of the States send
out several fertilizer bulletins each
year, each containing many pages of
figures giving the composition of
fertilizers as guaranteed, and as
found by analysis. AS a rule figures
are confusing to a farmer and some
what beyond him. The figures
/ though are all right and necessary,
and we must educate the farmer up
to the point where can use them in,
telligently, otherwise our bulletins
are of little use and our analytical
work has been largely in vain.
In all our bulletins there are few
pages of reading matter explaining
the tables and showing how values
are calculated, etc. A few give a
little more, but the majority do not,
and the same things are repeated
from bulletin to bulletin in all the
! States. j..
The principle differences in the
bulletins of different States are those
due to the individuality of the diff
ferent authors and to the different
laws under which they work. The
above mentioned explanations are
necessary, but we need not stop
there. After the necessary explana-