November, 1912. 



THE CANADIAN HORTICULTURIST 



255 



Gathering the Apple Crop in the Orchard of Mr. Galbraith, Bayfield, Ont. 



Commercial Fertilizers 



Bowmanville, Ont. 



Dr. J. B. Dandeno, 



THE use of commercial fertilizers has 

 been one of the most baffling ques- 

 tions with which the farmer and 

 fruit grower has had to contend. If the 

 application of commercial fertilizers to 

 the land had generally resulted in suc- 

 cess, there need be very little said, be- 

 cause they have been in somewhat gen- 

 eral use for a quarter of a century or 

 more. It is easy to find farmers who 

 are not loud in their praises of such fer- 

 tilizers, and the reason is they have not 

 always been a success. Millions of dol- 

 lars are spent annually in the United 

 States, and hundreds of thousands in 

 Canada for commercial fertilizers, and it 

 is safe to say that at least half of this 

 large amount is wasted, not because the 

 fertilizers have, or have not, certain ele- 

 ments in their composition, but because 

 they are not always .suitable to the land 

 to which they have been applied. 



There is generally an erroneous no- 

 tion legarding infertile soil, exhausted 

 soil, or over-cropped soil. The prevail- 

 ing idea is that such soil is infertile be- 

 cause it lacks plant food (I have never 

 yet met a man who could give a fair 

 definition of "plant food") whatever that 

 is. This is, in nearly all cases entirely 

 wrong. Soil is infertile because of some- 

 thing it has, rather than because of 

 something it lacks. Plant excretions 

 are the chief cause of infertility, and it 

 is in the decomposition of such material 

 that the application of fertilizers of any 

 kind proves of value. Commercial fer- 

 tilizers may remedy such conditions but, 

 in the majority of cases, they do not, 

 hence a loss and waste of time. 



matter, excepting possibly in the rarest 

 cases or under the most peculiar circum- 

 stances. There is no question as to the 

 benefit to be derived from barnyard 

 manure, and this is not because it con- 

 tains "plant food" (for you could carry 

 in your vest pocket all the "plant food" 

 that a load of barnyard manure con- 

 tains), but because it always supplies 

 abundant favorable bacteria and abund- 

 ant nutritive material for them. It has 

 also a neutralizing effect on all plant 

 excreta and it produces in the soil a good 

 physical condition relative to the water 

 supply. 



No mistake is made in applying barn- 

 yard manure or other excreta, but in 

 buying and using commercial fertilizers, 

 "patent medicine chances" are taken. 



To apply a commercial fertilizer with 

 prospect of success at least, three things 

 are necessary, First, a knowledge of the 

 effect of the previous crop on the soil ; 

 .secondly, a knowledge of the crop now 

 to be grown and its relation to the ex- 

 creta of the previous crop, and thirdly, 

 a knowledge of the biology of the soil. 



Up to the present these things are 

 only very vaguely known, consequently 

 the use of commercial fertilizers is more 

 or less like the use of patent medicine. 

 The defect is only occasionally remedied. 



Moreover, many of the commercial 

 fertilizers in the process of manufacture 

 have been heated to a tempeature so 

 high as to be destructive of all bacterial 

 life. .Such are of very doubtful value. 

 In the sale of and in the inspection of 

 commercial fertilizers, the chemical com- 

 position is usually given, i.e., so much 

 phosphoric acid ,so much potash, and so 

 much nitrogen, as if the value depended 

 upon these things. The value depends 

 chiefly upon whether the original bac- 

 terial life has been preserved, and whe- 

 ther the constituents of the fertilizer are 

 favourable to the development of nitri- 

 fying bacteria of the soil, and to those 

 organisms which prey uoon plant exe- 

 cretions. 



Certain fertilizers are adanted to cer- 

 tain crops and to certain soils, and the 

 only way to find out which, is to try 

 them bv usjng them on part of the field 

 so as to compare. 



Another common error is that oreranic 

 matter is taken in by the plant roots. 

 As a matter of fact, roots absorb inor- 

 ganic matter and water, but no organic 



Setting Trees * 



p. E. Angle, Simcoe, Ont. 



The problem to be solved when set- 

 ting trees is to set the trees straight 

 and in their exact position in the cheap- 

 est possible manner ; and to do it in such 

 a way that the men doing the work can- 

 not go wrong. 



There are several systems which mav 

 be followed. Among these are the fol- 

 lowing : 



Mark out the field with a plow by 

 plowing furrows both ways and planting 

 the trees at the intersections. This is 

 a good plan for one man to work, but 

 where a number of men are depended 

 upon there is enough chance for error 

 that the trees in all probability will be 

 very uneven in the rows, because there 

 is a space about six inches square at 

 each intersection in which the tree may 

 be planted. It is also diflficult to plow a 

 perfectly straight line through the field. 

 This system is not recommended on a 

 large scale. 



The stake system and planting board 

 is another method. By a system of sight- 

 ing and measuring, a stake is placed in 

 the position that each tree will occupy, 

 and the planting board is used in order 

 to have the tree in the position occupied 

 by the stake. The system is subject to 

 inaccuracies owing to the placing and 

 replacing of so many stakes, and also 

 entails a good deal of extra labor. 



The sighting system is one by which 

 a row of stakes, properly measured, is 

 placed around the field and two rows at 

 right angles to each other across the 

 field. The position of the tree is then 

 obtained by sighting in line with two 

 stakes on at least two sides of each tree ; 

 that is, the two lines will meet at right 

 angles where the tree is to be planted. 

 This is a difficult method to get absol- 

 utely correct, and may require extra men 

 to sight if those doing the planting are 

 incompetent. 



In the wire system the wire should be 



•Addreu delivered «t, Short CmirBC in Fruit 

 Qrowing. 0. A. 0., 1912. 



