2-3 EDWARD VII. 



SESSIONAL PAPER No. 16 



A. 1903 



REPORT OF THE CHEMIST. 



(Frank T. Shutt, M.A., F.I.C., F.C.S., F.R.S.C.) 



Dr. "Wm. Saunders, 



Director, Dominion Experimental Farms, 

 Ottawa. 



Ottawa, December 1, 1902. 



Sir, — I have the honour to submit herewith the sixteenth annual report of the 

 Chemical Division of the Experimental Farms. 



Therp. has been no effort to incorporate all the results obtained in the laboratories 

 during the past year, many of the investigations being still in progress and others hav- 

 ing already received pubUcity in bulletin form. Further, the desirability of reducing 

 the size of the complete report has made it necessary to omit certain details which, 

 though interesting, are not perhaps essential to the elucidation of the results now pre- 

 sented. I trust, however, in the attempt to be concise there has been no sacrifice of 

 clearness and that the explanations and deductions given will be found sufiiciently 

 explicit for the purposes of our readers. As in past years, there has been a great deal 

 of work, also, which does not find a place in the annual report from the fact that the 

 results are considered of value only to the individual for whom it was made. Of such 

 work, we may instance the examination of a number of soils and other samples received 

 from farmers. It must not be thought, however, that this has not proved useful and 

 valuable, for the Experimental Farms system seeks to educate the farmer as an individual 

 as well as to benefit the agricultural community as a whole. 



Certain investigations that have involved considerable labour, are reported upon 

 elsewhere. Of these we may refer to articles on the fattening of chickens, and on the 

 preservation of eggs, in the present report of the poultry manager ; the examination of 

 Canadian honey, in the transactions of the Ontario Bee-keepers' Association ; and the 

 analysis of Canadian Creamery Butter, as published by the Dairy Division, Department 

 of Agriculture, Bulletin No. 4, New Series. Mention may also be made of the bulletin 

 on Clover as a Fertilizer, (No. 40, July, 1902, Experimental Farm Series), the joint 

 work of Dr. Saunders and the writer. 



No attempt will be made in this letter to summarize the work in this report, but 

 attention may be briefly directed to those investigations which appear to the writer as 

 being of greater interest or importance and which afforded results of immediate and 

 practical value to Canadian agriculture. 



The Relation of Cover Crops, Sod and Surface Tillage, to the Moisture content of 

 Soils — This research, begun in 1901, has been continued during the past season, the 

 experiments being carried out on soils of the Central Farm orchards. Further and 

 valuable information has been gained on this important subject, especially instructive 

 being the data obtained from the plot under a two year old sod. According to this 

 year's results, the latter makes a very much heavier draught upon soil moisture tlian a 

 system which calls for cover crops {e.g., clover) and surface tillage. 



Fodders and Feeding Stuffs. — Under this caption we include, first, a report on 

 certain mixed ensilages, (clover and corn'> produced on the Central Farm, and show tliat 

 from such a combination it is possible to obtain a succulent, palatable food considerably 

 richer in the flesh-forming constituents than corn ensilage. 

 16—9 129 



