Richmond daily register. (Richmond, Madison County, Ky.) 1917-1978, 1920-09-03
THE. VALUE
QE FERTILIZER
(The. Country Gentleman)


(The Country Gentleman)
Does it pay to fertilize the corr
crop with commercial fertilizer !
Anybody will easily state that it pays
to use barnyard manure on the corr
crop, but when it comes to CONNER.
cial fertilizer most people are il
doubt and experiment stations have
expressed themselves very. conserva-
lively on the question.
During the early years of the war
Ae spring we wanted to fertilize a
fifty-acre. cornfield with commercial
fertilizer in order to increase the crop
as much as possible during war
times. There was really a fertilizer
famine that year andfwe had to use
odds and ends of many different
brands. We did not have enough to
finish out the field, so that involunta-
riiy left check strip that was infer
tilted. ~
This field was on Woodland Farm,
one of our most fertile fields, one that
has received. very liberal attention
for the past forty years. It has been
continuously manured, has received
commercial fertilizer literally for at
least thirty years, and had a rotation
during the past twenty years Of four
years of alfalfa and two years corn.
On this field we. used everything we
could think of during, the year in
question, from no fertilizer at all to
bone meal, different brands of COM
plete fertilizer, and finally basic Stag,
or basic phosphate, as it is now being
called.
1t was a good corn. year and all
corn did pretty well. The field prob
ably averaged. eighty bushels an acre.
maybe leighty-flve, Most of it was
fortified either with bone meal or
basic phosphate. All the. corn was
weighed as shusked, so there was no
about the yield.
The results We're interesting, The
portion receiving no fertilizer yielded
about twenty-five bushels an acre less
than the part which received basic
1t yielded about fifteen
bushels less than the part which re-
ceived bone meal, and about six OF
seven bushels less than the part that
received complete fertilizer. This
complete fertilizer was principally
of phosphoric acid. One of
the brands used was about 1-12-1.
was about 2-S-3.
For some reason the results on this
field did not make so serious an i'm
preston, upon us as they might, ALI
though it was a perfectly fair test,
the rows running lengthwise of the
field and eqpalizing, the character of
the soil from end to end.
Another year we had a test on an
other farm. This. was a fifty acre
field, largely black ground, but. some
White clay. rather. low. lying but pref
". well drained, the field being at the
pack of the farm where it never re-
.eives manure. Until the past few
years it has, receiveds only. moderate
amount of commercial fertilizer of
my kind. It seems to: be hungry for
phosphate and responds to that MAJ
erial.
. On this field we applied 300 pounds
n acre of basic slug. We intention
lily left two. shock rows without any
ertilizer for a check. There We're
bout forty shocks to the row. The
wo shock rows husked about eighty
We and ninety-fve bushels respect
gely. The fortified corn on the rest
f the, field made approximately 1901
ushels to, forty shocks or at the ratesI
f seventy-fiye bushels an. acre where
S the check strips made. at the rate
about fifty-eight bushels.
There seems to be no getting |