72 



IRISH GARDENING. 



"IRISH GARDENING." 



an illustrated monthly. 

 Offices-53 Upper Sackville Street. Dublin. 

 Subscription.— 3 per annum, posl Iree. 



Editorial.— All Editorial CmmunicationB, copy, ami photographs 

 should be a.idressed to • The Editor." 



Business Communications.— All letters regarding Subscriptions, 

 Advertisements, and other business matters must be addressed to 

 •• The Manager." 



Artificial Manures, 



G.ARDEXERS, a.s a rule, use too much — 

 and .sometimes far too much — f"arm\ard 

 manure. Its excessive use tends to 

 promote an undesirable acidity in the soil which 

 calls for the immediate application of lime as a 

 corrective. A moderate use of such bulky 

 org-anic material is good for crops, as it keeps 

 close soils more open and makes light soils 

 more firm, increases the water-holding power 

 of all, and contributes to a greater or less 

 extent all the manurial constituents required by 

 crops. Considered, however, from the latter 

 point of view only, farmyard manure contains 

 really a very small quantity of plant food in 

 proportion to its bulk. To start with, it con- 

 tains over 80 per cent, of water, and of the 

 remainder a very small percentage indeed can 

 be used by the plants as food, perhaps about 

 y^ per cent, of nitrogen, yn per cent, of phos- 

 phoric acid, and about 3 per cent, of potash, 

 showing that the great value of farmyard 

 manure lies not so much in its food-yielding 

 power as in other properties associated with 

 the physical rather than the chemical aspect of 

 soils. It is clear, therefore, that if our only 

 object is to supply our crops with food material, 

 we can do it more easily, more cleanly, and 

 more economically by making use of artificial 

 manures. They have the further advantage of 

 enabling us to apply one kind of manure alone, 

 if in our judgment the soil is lacking in only 

 one of the necessary constituents of plant food. 

 y^nd if we purchase on analysis we can more- 

 over apply such constituent in any required 

 quantity. So that the best method of manuring 

 is that in which both kinds of manures are 

 used — farmyard manure to improve the physical 

 character of the soil and to supply an all-round 

 diet to crops, and artificial to strengthen the 

 supply of any ingredient or ingredients that the 

 soil happens to be weak in or the particular 

 crop specially demands in larger quantit\-. 



The foregoing remarks are suggested b\- the 



receipt of a little book on "Artificial Manures,"* 

 by Professor Percival of University College, 

 Reading, in which the subject of the use of 

 arlificials is treated simply and scientifically, 

 and in a way we do not remember having met 

 before in any work on the subject. The author 

 starts with first principles, giving reasons for 

 the need of manures, the nature of the sub- 

 stances required by plants, and the general 

 character of the different kinds of manures used 

 by gardeners. This is followed by a chapter 

 dealing with the kinds of manures in detail — 

 "what they do, and when to apply them." 

 Taking the three most important manurial 

 constituents — nitrogen, phosphoric acid, and 

 potash — we find the following clear statements 

 as to " what they do " : — 



( 1) ^'Xitrogenoiis Manures. — All these tnaiiutes encour- 

 age plants to iiinke leaf, stem and root, and are, 

 therefore, partictilarly useful to youngf crops which arc 

 just commencing to grow, and also to all crops which 

 are cultivated for their succulent or fleshy leaves, stems 

 and roots. They are especially beneficial to and 

 improve the yield of asparajfiis, broccoli, beet, carrots, 

 celery, cabbage, cauliflower, kale, lettuce, matigels, 

 onions, parsnips, radishes, rhubarb, savoys and turnips. 



" Nitrogenous manures should be used very sparingly 

 o\\ peas, beans and tomatoes. None of them last very 

 long in the soil, which is another reason why they 

 should be used in small quantities and often." 



(2) •' P/ii/sphatic Manures. —Ma.nurcs of ih.is class 

 have the opposite effect on plants to th.it produced by 

 the nitrogenous kind. 



" They check rank growth and encourage the produc- 

 tion and setting of flowers, fruit and seeds. Plants 

 grown with plenty of phosphates are stocky and sturdy, 

 and vou cannot go wrong in applying one or other of 

 them to any kind of crop. 



" Taken as a whole they improve the qunlity of 

 vegetables, flower, or fruit more than any other class of 

 manure on any land, and very few gardens or fields 

 have ever had enough applied to them. 



" They are of especial benefit to turnips, swedes, peas 

 and beans, l^ut no crop should be grown without being 

 supplied with a phosphatic inanure of some sort." 



(3) ^^ Potash Manures. — These assist the plant bolh in 

 the early stages when the leaves and stem are being 

 foriTied and later when the flowers and fruit are setting. 



"They are of great benefit to potatoes, peas, beans, 

 beet, asparagus, carrots and turnips, and to plants 

 grown for their flowers. They are of particular value 

 to apples, gooseberries, vines and all other fruit trees." 



The rest of the book (one-half) is devoted to 

 recipes giving the amoiuit and kind of artificial 

 manures to be used with different crops in the 

 vegetable, fruit, and flower garden, in con- 



• "Artificial Manures and How to Use Them in the Garden. 

 Orchard and Allotment " By Professor John Percival, M. A. Publish, d 

 by the author, Northcoat Avenue, Reading. Price one shilling. 



