The French Broad hustler. [volume] (Hendersonville, N.C.) 1896-1912, 1906-07-12
Facts About Plant Food.

Manufacturers of fertilizers make q
great mystery of the art of mixing the
various ingredients that go to fill up
their 200-pound sacks, writes E.. NJ.
Landsberg in the New York Evening
Post. They tell the farmer that it is
necessary to have skilled labor and
high-priced machinery to effect a per-
feet mixture, but a few experiments
will soon convince any farmer that he
can easily equal the best efforts of the
factories and save a substantial sum
on each ton. The process is very sim
pie. The farmer empties on the floor
of the barn the sacks Of the various
materials he is about to. use, spreads
them in alternate layers in a pile, SHOW
els the whole over and under thorough
" for fifteen minutes, throws the re-
suit through a screen, sacks it up
again, and he is ready to apply it to, his
land.
Screens are easily made and are ex-
tremely useful; they reduce the chem
ieals, ETC., to a perfect form for drill
ing, besides insuring a thorough mix
ture. A strip of heavy wire cloth, four
holes to the inch, is nailed to half-inch
boards, making a sieve three feet wide
by five feet long.
Say a farmer wants to apply to each
acre of cotton 500 pounds of S-S-3
goods, and instead of paying from $25
to $2S to a dealer. he wants TO- mix it
himself. He pours on the barn floor in
front Of the sieve a sack of sixteen per
cent. acid phosphate, two sacks Of cot
tonseed meal and half a sack of kainit.
Acid phosphate will cost him about
$50 a ton; meal he will probably have
on his farm, but we must reckon it at
$25 per ton; kainit will cost $3.50 a
ton. So a ton Of fertilizer made ac-
cording to this, a common formula in
the cotton regions, will cost him $3.50,
a saving of from 81 to $40 over the
manufactured article; furthermore, he
has absolute assurance of the contents
of his own goods, something he can
never know with the ready-made fer
~tiliZers, unless he goes to the expense
of having them analysed.
Most fertilizers and most soils need a
higher percentage of potash than the
general run Of goods" furnish. But
as soon as the farmer tries to buy any
thing other than the standard analysis
he must pay such high prices that he
usually drops the idea. By mixing at
home he can make any formula he
thinks necessary, with only a slight in
crease in cost.
Suppose the tobacco farmer wants an
SAT goods eight pei cent. phosphoric
acid. four per cent. nitrogen and sever
per cent. potash).
Materials needed are: One thousand
pounds sixteen per cent. acid phOs-
phate; 800 pounds dried blood; $50
pounds sulphate of potash; 400 pounds
gypsum or plain dirt.
The blood runs about fourteen per
cent. ammonia, and costs $50 per ton.
Sulphate of potash runs fifty per cent.
pure potash and costs about $50 per
ton. The farmer must pay the deaer
from $50 to S35 per ton for SAT goods;
he a mix them himself for $23 to $50
per ton, saving from so to So per ton
on their cost.
These materials can probably be
bought enough cheaper than the com
mercial fertilizers to allow the farmer
So or $40 for his work.
Glover, vetch, soy beans, cowpeas
and similar crops will furnish most of
the nitrogen a crop needs; ground bone
or acid phosphate is a cheap source of
phosphoric acid. But potash can be
restored to the soil only by the use of
kainit or sulphate or muriate of potash.
1t is usually advisable to supply the
growing crop with twice as much pot
ash as ammonia, and a slightly larger
quantity of phosphOric acid. 1t need
hardly be pointed out that since the
manufa cturerS have to buy all their
potash in Germany, they do their best
to make the farmer believe he needs
but little of it on his lands.
On stiff clay soils, when growing
wheat or cotton, kainit prevents rust,
also damage by frost and drought. To-
bacco, potatoes, strawberries and pea
nuts need a heavy percentage of pot
ash.