No. 6. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 405 



izer controls of the Eastern and Middle states, though New York has 

 long abandoned the practice. 



Doubtless, the reason for the requirement has been the supposed 

 simplicity of comparison it aftoids to the buyer, who, at the outstart 

 and too often even yet, has little clear appreciation of the meaning of 

 the analyses with which the valuations are associated. 



It may be a surprise, therefore, when I tell you that I know of 

 no fertilizer control officer charged with the responsibility for mak- 

 ing the valuations, who does not regard the policy as unfortunate 

 for the fertilizer buyer, and who would not gladly be relieved of the 

 requirement that he make such valuations. 



The reasons for this attitude are these, in part: 



(1) The buyer too commonly regards the valuation to be based 

 strictly upon the analysis. It is not so based. It states only the 

 cost of the same weights as appear in the goods, of fertilizer consti- 

 tuents bought in high-grade materials at average market prices; 

 whereas the fertilizer may have been made of cheaper, low-grade ma- 

 terials. 



The Chemist soon reaches the limit beyond which present methods 

 afford no clue to the nature of the raw materials used. 



(2) The buyer ought to consider his crops needs first, and then 

 try to supply their fertilizer requirements as economically — I don't 

 say "as cheaply" — as he can. The valuation system tends to make 

 the buyer look to see that the selling price is not above the valuation 

 and, if satisfied as to this, to buy without making sure that the fer- 

 tilizer is what his crops want. The result is as though, having se- 

 cured your wife's promise to bake you a cake upon your own promise 

 to buy the lacking raw materials, you were to visit the store, and 

 and finding flour worth much less a pound than sugar and butter, 

 were to carry back'to your wife only the flour, while she had neither 

 sugar nor butter; or, if in other cases, you having bought some of 

 each cake ingredient known to you, at an average low price, your 

 wife were to say she already had at home plenty of sugar and butter, 

 but that you hadn't bought enough flour. How much cake could you 

 expect? As the fertilizer control official has considered the great 

 degree to which the commercial valuations are mis-applied, he has 

 reached the conclusion that a current review of fertilizer conditions 

 without the attaching of valuations to individual analyses, would 

 promote intelligent fertilizer buying; but that the present system 

 of an assumed valuation acompanying each analysis, retards the de- 

 velopment of intelligent buying. The subject is one deserving your 

 careful consideration. 



REPORT OF VETERINARIAN 



By DR. C. J. MARSHALL 



Mr. Chairman and Members of the State Board of Ag- 

 riculture: A year ago when our meeting was convened, we 

 were in the midst of a bad rumpus on account of foot-and-mouth 

 disease in the State. Since that time the work has been cleaned up 



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