176 STATE BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



out Michigan is spending less money for fertilizing his fields than for- 

 merly. Whether he should not spend more is a question worthy of con- 

 sideration. Experiments with commercial fertilizers cannot be tried by 

 us at the experiment station satisfactorily; we must look to our farmers 

 to try more of these experiments on their own farms, and, while I have no 

 authority to announce it, I think we shall soon have some word from this 

 direction (not statistics), but results reached by farmers in their individ- 

 ual localities, and on a wide difference of soil. 



DISCUSSION. 



Mr. E. C. Bearce, of Grand Rapids, who was to have led the discussion, 

 not being present, it was continued generally. 



Q: I am a resident of St. Joseph county, and I think plaster would be 

 included there; we used plaster extensively in those years, but later we 

 have used little of it. 



Prof. Kedzie: Did you ever use commercial fertilizers much in that 

 county? 



A : Not but little. 



Q: Would you advise using plaster on new sown clover, in order to 

 give it a start? 



Prof. Kedzie: I would like to be able to answer that question. Five 

 years ago I could have said, right off, and could have been sure — ten 

 years ago, perhaps — but now I have come up here to Grand Rapids to find 

 out that point. How many at the present time have abandoned the use 

 of plaster, in this sense — that they place no confidence in plaster applied 

 the way it was ten years ago? (Votes were 36 to 40 in favor of plaster.) 

 How many believe that if yon use plaster today, you get as good results 

 as ten years ago? (No votes at all. Experience called for.) 



Mr. : I live in St. Joseph county, and I remember well 



when plaster was shipped in there by train loads, and my experience is 

 this: I have tried it by sowing a strip ancl leaving a strip, and T 

 couldn't see any difference. But I will say this, that in years past, we 

 never failed to get a catch of clover, and we always had the plaster on. 

 My father hauled plaster way back in the forties, and he thought it paid 

 him well. Then the railroads came in and it was shipped in in carloads, 

 but of late years the plaster has been dropped entirely. Those who do 

 so, say that it holds the moisture, but we have abandoned it almost 

 entirely. 



Mr. : I live in Kent county, where they had plaster forty 



of fifty years ago, and they used to drive in from St. Joseph county and 

 Kalamazoo and take back a load of plaster. As far as I know there is 

 but little plaster used now, here in this county, compared to the amount 

 used thirty years ago. 



Mr. : I am strictly a mossback, but I have heard gentlemen 



like Mr. Glidden and others, men of much experience, say that they 

 thought they could write their name with plaster on a new seeded field, 

 and read it all summer in the effect on the crop. Now ten years ago 

 there was a fight on between the plaster bed owners and the State 

 Grange. Plaster was then put on board the cars here at the price of 



