Manurial Needs and Resources. 



151 



be more profitably employed as food for pigs, poultry, etc., they 

 have considerable value as manure. If they were collected in sacks 

 by natives — easily done at night or in the early morning on their 

 roosting-places — killed by being dipped into boiling water, and then 

 dried in the sun, they could be ground in any ordinary mill. The 

 powder thus formed, if not utilised as food, would form an exceed- 

 ingly valuable manure. The product from the adult brown locust 

 was examined recently by the writer, and was found to contain 9.5 per 

 cent, of nitrogen, 0.28 per cent, of lime, and 1.59 per cent, of 

 phosphoric acid. Compared with prices of artificial manures at the 

 coast, ground locusts would thus have a fertilising value of about jP^"] 

 10 1 - per ton. 



It is true that they would probably be somewhat slow in their 

 action as a manure, but they would undoubtedly contribute largely 

 to the fertility of the soil to which they were applied, while the 

 advantage to the country at large resulting from their destruction 

 during the breeding season would be undoubted. 



Still another product, possessing value as a local source of 

 nitrogen (and other manurial substances) is the material composing 

 ant-heaps. These are abundant enough in many districts, and when 

 crushed afford a fine-grained soil which is much richer in nitrogen 

 than the soil of the surrounding veld, and could be used with 

 advantage for seed-beds for nurseries and gardens. This plan has 

 been practised by several farmers and others in the Transvaal with 

 great success, and it might be much more largely adopted. 



A specimen of such material from an ant-heap, and another of 

 the soil taken three feet away, near Christiana, were examined by the 

 writer, with the following results : — 



Stones retained by 3 mm sieve 



Moisture 



*Loss on ignition (organic matters, etc.) 



Insoluble matter (sand, etc.) 



Iron oxide and alumina 



Lime 



Magnesia 



Potash 



Phosphoric acid 



■^Containing nitrogen 



" Available " Potash 



,, Phosphoric acid 



The superiority of the ant-heap material in organic matter, 

 nitrogen, and " available " potash and phosphoric acid over the veld 

 soil shows that it might be used with great advantage on poor soils, 

 though, of course, it is not worth transporting any distance. Probably 



