28 EXPERIMENT STATION RECORD. 



feieiit ])ioi)erties, the relative proportions of wliicli are almost unknown 

 tons. \i is iiioie a question of the composition of the nitrogenous 

 comi)OuiHls than of the (juautities of these present. In 14 samples of 

 malt it was found that from 28 to 40 per cent of the total nitrogen of 

 the barley went into the wort. The nitrogen content of the latter 

 depends less on the quantity of nitrogen in the barley than on the 

 process of malting practiced. 



The yield of extract decreases as the nitrogen content of the barley 

 increases, viz, about 2 per cent for every 3 per cent of protein con- 

 tained in the barley. The author states that this has an influence only 

 on the market value of the bai?ley and not on its value for malting pur- 

 poses. He considers the mealiness of the barley of no importance in 

 judging its malting value, and quotes Prof. Gronlund {Tidsskr. Lan- 

 dokon., 1882, p. 654), whose investigations show that even a very hard 

 barley may be changed almost entirely to a soft barley during the ger- 

 mination by the action of water for an extended period. These results 

 were confirmed by Nielsen ( Ugeskr. Landmlind, 1883). — F. w. woll. 



Experiments with different phosphates on red clover, E. von 

 LiEBENBERG {Mitt. Ycr. F'ord. landw. Versuchs. Oesterr., 1893, No. 8, 

 pt. II, pp. 151-153). — It is generally accepted as a fiict that leguminous 

 plants respond to applications of phosphoric acid and potash, but do 

 not require applications of nitrogen, and it is a common practice to 

 depend upon the excess of phosphoric acid in the fertilizer applied to 

 'the cereal croj) in which clover is usually sown to supply the following 

 crop of clover with this element. 



The observation of the author that manuring of cereals with phos- 

 ])horic acid and potash on the soils used often jiroved uni^rofitable, and 

 doubt as to the extent of the after action of phosphoric acid applied to 

 previous crops, led to the institution of experiments to determine whether 

 direct manuring of clover with phosphoric acid is economical and 

 whether the cheaper insoluble phosphates might not be substituted for 

 the expensive superphosphates for this purpose. Ground Thomas slag, 

 steamed bone meal, Eedonda phospha-te, bone ash, and spodium super- 

 phosphate were applied November 5 at rates of 60 and 120 kg. per 

 hectare to clover seeded in rye on triplicate plats (containing IGO sq. 

 m.) of soil of known composition, 4 plats remaining unmanured. 



The tabulated yields of hay at 2 cuttings show that spodium super- 

 phosphate was the only manure which increased the yield, and that the 

 use of this fertilizer was profitable. The plats receiving the crude phos- 

 phates actually gave a lower yield than those receiving no fertilizer. 



The results with the superphosphate seemed to be due to the more 

 complete diffusion of the phosphoric acid of this material in the soil. 

 With the crude phosphates, on the other hand, the small amount of 

 phosphoric acid which became available remained in the surface layer 

 of the soil and was exhausted by tlie clover in its earlier stages of 

 growth, but when the plant developed and its roots spread out in the 

 lower layers of the soil it suffered from a deticiency of phosphoric acid. 



