EXPERIMENTAL STATIONS — TUENIP CROP 1882. 365 



the washing down of potash or sulphuric acid during the winter. 

 That view, however, is not supported by the experiments on 

 other plots, for on plots 11 and 22, where potash was applied 

 without phosphate, there is very little difference between the 

 summer and winter manuring, and in plot 21, which received 

 superphosphate without potash, the same beneficial result of 

 early manuring is observed ; while plot 38, which had sulphuric 

 acid applied to it at both seasons, shows no advantage from the 

 earlier application. The advantage obtained by the early applica- 

 tion of superphosphate is also shown in plots 28, 29, and 30, 

 where the plot to which the most soluble phosphate was applied 

 derived greatest benefit from the winter manuring. It is evident 

 that we have here a very interesting fact brought out, which 

 requires further investigation. 



Eegarding the nitrogenous manures, the two chief manures of 

 the kind are nitrate of soda and sulphate of ammonia. The 

 plots 13 and l-i, in common with the rest of the station, did not 

 receive these manures till after the turnips were thinned. They 

 are two very even plots, a slight advantage lying sometimes 

 with the one and sometimes with the other; upon the whole, 

 however, there seems to be a gradual improvement taking place 

 in plot 13 at Pumpherston. 



Of the slowly-acting nitrogenous manures, half was applied in 

 winter and half in summer, and it is evident that they have been 

 improved by lying in the soil for some months before sowing. 

 This is especially seen on plot 15, where shoddy was again 

 tried at Pumpherston, owing to there being no horn dust 

 obtainable. The shoddy was on this occasion dissolved along 

 with the phosphate, and thus put into a state more favourable for 

 the plant than in 1879, when it was put on in the undissolved 

 condition. The result has proved that dissolved shoddy, if allowed 

 to be long enough in the soil, is capable of acting as a manure, 

 and that manufacturers who use shoddy as a source of nitrosen in 

 their "dissolved bones," or other dissolved manures, are employing 

 a material which in the dissolved state may be a useful nitro- 

 genous manure, if only applied early enough. The late applied 

 shoddy has proved a failure. This is an ex[)eriment which would 

 require to be repeated before one could have any definite assertion 

 to make regarding the relative value of dissolved shoddy. 



Plot 15, at Harelaw, was manured with fine horn dust, and 

 this manure has done very well, but not so well as might have 

 been expected from the success which attended its application to 

 cereals. 



Dried blood has not done so well as we should have expected. 

 It is probable that early manuring has been a little ovenlone 

 in this case. Had it been aj>{)lied only one or two months 

 before sowing, the effect might have been better, for when dried 



