964 Popular Editions of Station Bulletins of the 



commercial value of the ingredients given in the present or past 

 season's " Fertilizer Bulletin." 



In individual instances, however, brands fell considerably below 

 guaranty; so that the purchaser of dried blood from one lot sampled 

 would have received $3.69 less plant food than was guaranteed; 

 one lot of muriate of potash was worth $3.90 less than its guaranty 

 called for; one of ground fish $4.13 less than the guaranty; and one 

 of tankage $6.90 less than its supposed content of nitrogen and phos- 

 phoric acid. The brands of calcium-containing materials apparently 

 fell below legal requirements as a class, and some really were poor 

 value for the money invested, but in other cases the content of 

 magnesium was great enough to make the lime compound fully 

 as efficient in sweetening the soil as the guaranty would indicate; 

 for magnesium, though not specified as an ingredient to be guaranteed, 

 is even more valuable than lime, pound for pound, in correcting soil 

 acidity. 



Sodium nitrate, basic slag, floats, sulphate of potash, kainit and 

 bone and potash mixtures held well up to their guarantees; but acid 

 phosphate, muriate of potash, bone, tankage, sheep manure, mixtures 

 of acid phosphate and potash, and wood ashes fell below their 

 guarantees in too many instances to be thoroughly satisfactory from 

 the purchaser's standpoint. 



Previous to 1910 the fertilizer law made it a viola- 

 Change in tion if the goods fell below the guaranty for any 

 law a loss element by a fixed amount (one-third of one per ct. 



to farmer in for nitrogen, or one-half of one per ct. for phos- 



some cases, phoric acid or potash) without allowance for any 

 excess that might exist in other elements. This 

 was felt to be unfair in two respects: It made the maker of high- 

 grade goods liable to penalty for a much smaller proportionate 

 deficiency in his goods than the maker of low-grade brands; and it 

 might frequently punish the manufacturer who really gave far more 

 plant food value in two elements than the brand was short in the 

 third ingredient. In attempting to remedy these defects the law 

 was changed in 1910 to allow deficiencies, up to a certain limit, to 

 be balanced by excesses in other elements; and to subject the manu- 

 facturer of a brand to prosecution for proportionate rather than 

 fixed deficiencies. By the new law, a deficiency up to 10 per ct. 

 of any element is allowed without penalty; and up to 20 per ct. if 

 the monetary value of the deficiency is made up by an excess of one 

 or both of the other elements. With many brands this law is to 

 the advantage of the consumer; with others, it may be decidedly 

 to his disadvantage, and allow deliberate over-guaranty of goods 

 without replacement by a financial equivalent and without legal 

 penalty. 



In low-grade goods, those in which the guaranties are not above 

 3.3 per ct. of nitrogen and 5 per ct. of phosphoric acid or of potash, 



