The Bulletin. 69 



and. let the farmers draw the conclusions, and I hold that in many cases the 

 practical farmer who knows the soil is better able to draw practical conclu- 

 sions from the data of the scientist than is the scientist who does not know 

 agriculture. At any rate, you will agree that the farmer is entitled to the 

 data rather than merely the conclusions. I wish to call your attention again 

 to this statement, that the enormous quantities of raw phosphate employed 

 should have furnished at least some available phosphorus for the plants. 

 Would you agree that if 2 grams of raw phosphate contain no available 

 phosphorus, 20 grams should contain some available phosphorus? It seems 

 to me that the enormous quantity has no significance. If two grams have no 

 available phosphorus, then no quantity will have it, for raw rock phosphate is 

 not available. You ask me how much is available. None of it is available; 

 and, gentlemen, don't choose it unless you are going to make it available — 

 unless, as Professor Goodrich says, you are going to control the fertility. 

 If you are going to plow under decaying vegetable matter, then you can make 

 it available. 



Moi-e than twenty years ago the Pennsylvania Experiment Station began the 

 oldest experiments with fine-ground rock phosphate in the United States. I 

 know of no such trustworthy investigations with raw phosphate in Europe. 

 There is no European record of any long-continued practical investigation 

 with fine-ground rock phosphate, or at least none has been found by diligent 

 search. 



Pennsylvania began growing a rotation of crops with corn, oats, wheat, and 

 mixed timothy and clover. For the yearly average of twelve years they 

 reported the following results : Where bone-meal was applied they reported 

 an average gain of $2.83 per acre. Where raw rock phosphate was used they 

 report a gain of $2.45 ; where reverted phosphate was used they reported a gain 

 of $1.61 per acre, and where acid phosphate was used they reported a gain of 

 48 cents. Now, those are not my figures ; I know nothing about it except that 

 it was published in the Pennsylvania reports at the end of twelve years work. 

 I do not know of any other long-continued investigation in Pennsylvania upon 

 this subject. I have given you the figures taken directly from their reports. 



I have also figured the increase in yields at the prices used in Illinois : 

 corn at 35 cents a bushel, which is below the ten-year average ; oats at 30 

 cents, wheat at 70 cents, and hay at $6 a ton. You would probably double 

 these results. But, gentlemen, at these prices, where they used $1.05 worth of 

 raw phosphate they got back $5.85 in increased crops. I wish to impress upon 

 you that this is not my opinion, but it is the computed result from the report 

 published in Pennsylvania. Now, where they put in $4.71 worth of bone-meal 

 they got back $8.41 as an average for twelve years. In other words, every 

 dollar put into rock phosphate has, on an average, brought back $5..57, leaving 

 $4.57 net. 



Ohio has done some work with raw phosphate. I just bring you the data. 

 They have been working with it for fifteen years. As an average of fifteen 

 years, in a rotation of corn, wheat and clover, the corn on unfertilized laud 

 made 33 bushels per acre; where they applied 8 tons of farm manure per 

 acre once in three years, the average yield was 54.6 bushels; but where they 

 applied $1.20 worth of raw rock phosphate the average of the fifteen years 

 gave them 62.4 bushels, or 7.8 bushels more corn where the raw phosphate was 

 used. Likewise the yield of wheat was 4.7 bushels more and the hay .48 ton 

 more where the raw phosphate was applied for corn. 



I feel like emphasizing the fact that we should not apply fertilizer for any 

 one crop, but apply for "the whole rotation. I use raw phosphate on my own 

 farm, applying it once in six years for the six-year rotation — a ton to the acre 

 once in six years. At the end of the six years half of it is left. I conclude 

 that the better farmers in this State use about $3 worth a year of complete 

 fertilizers — the average farmer who is fertilizing. I use $1 a year for. my 

 phosphate. 



I had a letter a while ago from a gentleman in Georgia, and he said that 

 Georgia farmers pay out about $25,000,000 to $30,000,000 a year for fertilizers. 

 We have two twenty-year averages for Georgia, and I find as an average for 

 the first twenty vears the yield of corn for the State of Georgia was 10.8 

 bushels; and as the average for the next twenty years the yield was 10.8 



