256 Missouri Agricultural Report. 



spreader, or at least a wagon used for this work only, is very use- 

 ful and almost necessary. 



The other method is to allow the manure to accumulate in the 

 stall or covered feeding shed while it is constantly tramped by the 

 animals and kept moist by the liquid excrement, sufficient bedding 

 being used to absorb the excess and to keep the stock clean, and 

 then to haul and spread it on the land when conditions permit. 

 It should not be left, however, to dry out and heat and decompose 

 in the stalls or sheds long after the animals have been turned out 

 to pasture. 



Every system of farming should be so planned as to be both 

 profitable and permanent, which requires that the productive 

 capacity of the land must be maintained. We must understand 

 then what the soil contains, what materials are required to produce 

 crops, in which parts of the crops these different materials are de- 

 posited, so as to know what part of the produce may be sold off the 

 farm and what should be retained ; and also what is done with these 

 important materials when the crops are fed to live stock. 



The older prairie and timber soils of the states of the Central 

 West are exceedingly rich in potassium, but deficient in both nitro- 

 gen and phosphorus. In the worn hill lands nitrogen is usually 

 more deficient than prosphorus, while in the average long-culti- 

 vated prairie soil phosphorus is more deficient than nitrogen. 



When grain crops are produced, as corn, oats and wheat, about 

 two-thirds of the nitrogen and three-fourths of the phosphorus, 

 but only one-fourth of the potassium required for the crop are stored 

 in the grain or seed; while about one-third of the nitrogen, one- 

 fourth of the phosphorus and three-fourths of the potassium are 

 stored in the straw or stalks. 



Thus a large crop of corn (100 bushels to the acre) will con- 

 tain about 100 pounds of nitrogen in the grain and 48 pounds in the 

 stalks; 17 pounds of phosphorus in the grain and 6 pounds in the 

 stalks; 19 pounds of potassium in the grain and 52 pounds in the 

 stalks. Quite similar relations exist between the grain and straw 

 of other crops. 



Now, with these facts in mind, it is plain to see that a system 

 of farming in which the grain is sold and only the stalks and straw 

 are kept on the farm and returned to the soil carries off in the 

 grain much of the nitrogen and phosphorus, in both of which 

 these soils are more or less deficient, and which should be returned 

 to the land ; while the potassium, of which the soil contains an 

 inexhaustible supply, is largely returned in the straw and stalks. 



