EXPERIMENT STATION REPORTS. 



237 



what better results than has muriate. Table 1) shows the jnelds of j^ieeu 

 material and of mint oil from one area. 



TABLE D— EFFECTS OF FERTILIZERS ON YIELDS OF MINT AND MINT OIL ON MUCK. 



Plot No. 



Treatment. 



Yield per acre. 



Green wt. 



tens. 



Oil 

 lbs. 



Lbs. green 

 wt. to pro- 

 duce 1 lb. 

 oil. 



First Crop. 



Second Crop. 



Total Crop. 



The fertilizer problem must be attacked from several angles. It is not 

 sufficient to study simply the effect of certain treatments on the acre 

 yield of crops but the quality of product must be considered. Moreover 

 in order to understand the results obtained when soils are fertilized ex- 

 haustive inve.stigations of the reactions between soil and fertilizer salts 

 must be conducted. Our plans call for these researches. Mr. C. H. 

 Spurway is making a study of the latter phases. According to him. "The 

 more imiportant developments of the year's w-ork are listed as follows: 



1. A man user ipt was recently submitted for a])proval and publication, 

 outlining: (a) a method for quantitative estimation of the more active 

 soil bases in mineral soils, and (b) a method for quantitative estimation 

 of the base deficiency in acid soils. This study also led to the following 

 conclusions: vSoil components, separately or collectively, are ami)lioteric 

 in nature and the degree of acidity of acid soils is proportional to the 

 ratio betw^een the active bases and acids and not to the excess quantity 

 of active acids; also, the degree of acidity of soils does not correlate with 

 the quantity of base required to neutralize them (lime requirement), but 

 the quantity of base required for neutralization deipends upon the total 

 quantity of active acids present in soils in excess of the quantity of active 

 base. These and other points discussed in the manuscript serve to em- 

 phasize the validity of conclusions presented in former publications. 



2. As an outgrowth of the foregoing described work, a method definitely 



