The Question Box. 273 



read or posted, can make rules for his neighbor. As a rule, how- 

 ever, I will recommend an application of phosphoric acid. We 

 have acid enough. You cannot afford to buy potash now, be- 

 cause, 100 years hence the land may be short of it. Heavy soils 

 have more potash than light ones, but the farmer must find out 

 for himself. I wish that the chemist could take a sample of 

 every soil, analyze it and tell just what the owner needed, but 

 he does not yet know how to do it. Possibly in the far-off future 

 he may be able to tell, but I doubt it. 



A farmer present said he had harvested a larger crop of bar- 

 ley on land fertilized heavily with phosphoric acid, while another 

 said he got no results from such on oats. 



Dr. Jordan. — You are just adding testimony to what I have 

 said. It all depends on the soil's need. Both of you gentlemen 

 are on the road to righteousness. Keep right along with your 

 experiments. I can't help you. 



What is a complete fertilizer? 



Dr. Jordan. — A complete fertilizer is known as one containing 

 a greater or lesser per cent, of nitrogen, phosphoric acid and 

 potash. An incomplete fertilizer does not contain all three, but 

 one may use such a fertilizer on his soil that would act as a com- 

 plete one, because the soil already contained the deficient element. 



What is the best and at the same time the cheapest fertilizer for the 

 farms of this section (Schenevus)? 



Mr. Van Alstyne. — The best fertilizer is good barn manure, that 

 is, that which contains the liquids as well as solids. Next comes 

 clover with some of the green crops plowed under. When we 

 have exhausted all our farm sources, we may buy commercial 

 fertilizers. But I would buy the ingredients, take them home and 

 mix them myself. Don't buy them mixed, nor be governed by the 

 smell. Know what the analysis is of each element, and see to 

 it that it is guaranteed. If you want nitrogen get it in the form 

 of nitrate of soda, dried blood or cotton seed meal; if potash is 

 required, buy the muriate; if phosphoric acid, buy dissolved 

 South-Carolina rock. These sources will give you the needed 

 percentages and in an available form. 



