No. 7. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 147 



form of muriate is beneficial in some eases. Wheat seems to give 

 somewhat better results when nitrogen is applied in the form of 

 nitrate of soda, so that plants seem to show a difference in their 

 preference for the source from which their food is derived, just as 

 we do sometimes. 



A Member: Is a mixture of equal parts of gypsum and float of 

 special value as a deodorizer, and what is its value as a fertilizer? 



PROF. McDowell : Float, of course, has not really any value 

 as a deodorizer or as an absorbent in the stable; I take it that is 

 what is meant there by deodorizer. It may be regarded possibly 

 as a preservative rather than as a deodorizer, that is to say, for use 

 in the stable to prevent the loss of ammonia. Of course sulphate 

 of lime or gypsum or dissolved South Carolina phosphate has the 

 power of absorbing these things. 



A Member: How would you undertake to advise a farmer which 

 to use, the soluble or insoluble, not knowing the condition of the soil? 



PROF. McDowell : I am going to ask Mr. Agee to answer that 

 question. 



MR. AGEE: I could not advise it. I don't believe that any one 

 could safely advise it. We have got a good deal of soil in Ohio and 

 Western Pennsylvania in which I believe the use of acid phosphate 

 is strictly dangerous. If you will go with me over the experimental 

 plot at the West Station Farm to-day, you will find there that every 

 field that the acid phosphate — that the acidulated fertilizer has 

 touched — that there their clover is unhealthy or absent. For that 

 reason I have learned to adv'se no man to use the acid phosphate 

 \\ ithout knowing that there is enough lime in that ground to correct 

 the acidity. 



I would just like to add one word if I may have the time. We 

 want to go over the State, all teaching the same lesson. I believe 

 we ought to gather up in one minute this thought, that where a 

 man has a soil full of humus or decayed vegetation on which some 

 phosphoric acid is needed, there we may very safely advise him to 

 use the float or, better still, to use basket-slaked or clear-cut rock 

 with animal bone. I believe you will flnd it will give good results. 

 But where you havu't that material, then a soluble series of phos- 

 phoric acid, and if you have made use of acidulated phosphate, you 

 must apply some lime or the day will come when clover will quit. 

 It has quit on tens of thousands of acres in Pennsylvania and on 

 more acres in Ohio, and the best service that can be done for the 

 farmer to-day, who needs money, is to teach him that a little bit of 

 lime applied to soils that have received acid phosphates, are nec- 

 essary to bring back the clover. 



