REPORT OF STATE HORTICULTURIST. 65 



I want to mention another thing in regard to fertilizers. A 

 great many men in this country are using a 4-8-10 or 3-8-7, — a 

 mixed fertilizer. If you buy potash at the market price, and 

 if you buy phosphoric acid in the form of acid phosphate, you 

 will be able to save the sum of $10 a ton which you pay for the 

 mixed fertilizer. If you buy a cheap commercial fertilizer you 

 will perhaps get 2 per cent nitrogen, 2 per cent phosphoric acid 

 and 9 per cent potash, and the rest dirt, and you are very much 

 disappointed if you cannot get a ton. Very likely you could 

 bring home in a pocket handkerchief all the fertilizing prin- 

 ciples in that fertihzer. The fertilizer manufacturers take a 

 certain amount of nitrogen, phosphoric acid and potash and 

 put it into a mill and grind it up and then put in a filler which 

 costs about $8.00 a ton. Why not buy your acid phosphate 

 and your muriate and your basic slag and mix it yourself ? Or 

 you need not mix it. I use all my fertilizers separate. I go 

 along with the phosphoric acid and then with the potash and it 

 is mixed when it is sown on the surface of the earth. We do 

 not use mixed commercial fertilizers on our farms at all. You 

 can save from eight to ten dollars a ton by buying chemicals. 



