costly than similar mixtures made at the factory. As Food for 

 to the first of these objections, it has been demonstrated Plants 

 by most of the experiment stations in the East and the 2 39 

 South that home-mixtures can be made mechanically 

 as satisfactory as the best of the commercial brands. 

 It is merely necessary to screen the single ingredients 

 and to use some sort of a filler like dry peat or fine loam 

 to prevent caking. The second objection is not at all 

 borne out by the actual experience of farmers who have 

 been using home-mixtures for years. 



Equipment and Methods for Home- Mixing. 



The equipment required for home-mixing is very 

 simple and inexpensive. It consists of a screen with 

 three (8) meshes to the inch, and about 4-5 feet long 

 and l]/2 to 2 feet wide, a shovel with square point, an 

 iron rake, and platform scales. 



The mixing may be done on a tight, clean barn 

 floor, and a heavy wooden post is useful for crushing 

 big lumps of the material; frequently the use of a 

 sieve may be dispensed with by this means. 



Previous to mixing, the materials are screened, the 

 lumps broken up and again screened. The mixing may 

 then be best accomplished by spreading out the most 

 bulky constituent in a uniform layer about six inches 

 thick. The next most bulky constituent is then similarly 

 spread out on top of the first, and is followed in its turn 

 by the others until the pile is complete. The several 

 layers are then thoroughly mixed by shovelling the en- 

 tire heap three or four times. Thorough mixing is 

 shown by the absence of streaks of different materials. 

 The mixture may be put in bags or other convenient 

 receptacles and kept in a dry place until needed. 



In mixing various materials some knowledge is re- 

 quired concerning the action of different ingredients 

 upon each other. Such knowledge will prevent the 

 danger of loss of constituents or the deterioration of 

 quality. The materials that should not be employed 

 together in mixed fertilizers are known as incompatibles. 

 As is pointed out in this connection in Farmers' Bulletin 

 No. 225, U. S. Department of Agriculture, it should be 



