40 



be transmuted into oil. The business of extracting- oil from the men- 

 Laden was commenced with the establishment of one factory about twenty 

 years ago. During the past season there have been seventeen facto- 

 ries in operation for a greater or less time on the shores of the Peconic 

 and Gardiner's Bay. The capital invested in these factories, with the 

 boats, nets, «S;c., is about half a million of dollars. Similar factories have 

 been established in Maine, Ehode Island, Connecticut, Xew Jersey, and 

 Virginia, so that the total amount invested in the business approxi- 

 mates a million of dollars. Last season there were over thirty gangs 

 of men, three boats to a gang, out in Peconic Bay, one of which 

 made a catch of 5,000,000 fish; the smallest catch was 500,000; the 

 average, 2,500,000. For a period of seven months over one hundred 

 vessels and upward of tliree hundred men were employed in the bays. 

 The oil extracted from the fish is used for various purposes of dressing 

 leather, in rope- walks, in painting, mixing with other oils, &c. The scrap 

 is used as manure. Last season the in-oduce was 7,105 tons of manure, 

 and 11,400 barrels of oil. 



MINERAL FOOD OF PLANTS. 



Profitable feeding of animals requires minute attention to quantity 

 and variety of food, proportioned to the varying requirements of the 

 different species, ages, and conditions ; and the economical growth of 

 plants demands in equal degree a knowledge of kinds and proportions 

 of plant food. A lack of this knowledge may cause the farmer to store 

 up expensive manures, which may remain unappropriated for years, 

 while the soil is too poor in other elements to jield a good return in the 

 crop cultivated upon it. The grasses, which deteriorate the soil less 

 rapidly than some other crops, will soon despoil the best of soils if their 

 product, hay, is regularly carried away, and no comjiensating fertilizers 

 are returned. The rate of exhaustion is indicated by the following- 

 table, prepared by Cuthbert W. Johnson, F. E. S., showing the propor- 

 tion of certain mineral constituents existing in the grasses named : 



