The Florida agriculturist. [volume] (DeLand, Fla.) 1878-1911, 1906-02-14

The stall manure was accumulated
under cattle, fed i'm box stalls. the
manure being trampled under foot
with liberal bedding. This manure
was taken out, treated and finally APP
piled to corn at the same time and in
the same manner and rate per acre as
the yard manure. If there was any
difference in the quality of food from
which the manure was produced it
was i'm favor of the yard manure.
| In the experiments begun in 1897,
corn was followed by wheat and
wheat by clover in three-year rota-
ton. without further manuring or fer
| tilizing. Three sections of land were
under experiment, so that each crop is
represented each season. The aver
age increase and value for each of the
three crops, corn wheat and hay, for
the eight years ending with 1904, was
computed as follows: Corn 80 cents
a bushel, wheat 81, corn slower So a
ton straw 50 and hay So.
Both yard and stall manure were
applied in each case to duplicate
| 1-16-acre plot of uniform land, lying
side by side and lying between and ad-
joining similar plots which received
| neither manure nor fertilizers, but
which had the benefit of the clover
crop which was grown every third
season. The increase for manure is
found by comparing the yields of the
MANFRED plots with those of the I'M
MANFRED plots between which they
| lie. The average yields of the I'M
MANFRED plots for the entire period
were 34.5 bushels corn per acre. 80
bushels wheat and 1878 pounds clover
hay. During three of the seasons the
wheat crop was severely injured by
Hessian fly and winter killing.
In every case stall manure produced
much larger increase of crop than
the similarly treated yard manure.
The difference however, is undOubt-
edly much smaller than actually eX-
listed between the two kinuS of
manure; for during its four or five
months exposure in the open yard not
only did it lose much of the more sol
uble. and therefore more valuable
parts by washing, but the manure it
self undoubtedly suffered a consider
able Shrinkage i'm bulk. In other
words, after ton of stall manure has
lain several months in an open barn
yard it will not weigh a ton. Farm
ers are familiar with the ease with
which potash is washed out of wood
ashes The potash of manure is I'M
dOubtedly quite as easily washed
away.
The considerable increase produced
by kainit and gypsum indicates that
these materials are very useful, and
their effect is probably to prevent the
waste of ammonia, as that is the only
effect which it would seem possible
to ascribe to them in common. The
substitution of phOSphates for the
kainit and gypsum produced a large
additional increase of crop, and it ap-
pears that these phOsphates probably
serve the same purpose as the kainit
and gypsum in preventing loss of am
mOnia, and also reinforce the manure
with needed phosphorus. While |
neither the total nor the net increase
from floats is yet as large as that
from acid phosphate, it is evident that
a beneficial effect was produced by |
the manure on the availability of the
phOsphOric acid in the floats. Under
the limitations of this test it has only |
been possible to incorporate the ma
terials with the manure a few weeks |
before the latter was applied to the |
crop. 1t seems reasonable to believe
that the effectiveness of the floats
would be increased by using this daily |