58 



shape but flinty in character." The timber was " yellow pine and larch, 

 filled with a dense growth of alders, tag and black, and blueberries ; 

 the surface was covered with moss 2 feet deep." The following crops 

 have been raised : 



Oats, good straw, light grain. Buckwheat, 25 to 30 bushels to the acre. Corn, not 

 a success. Potatoes, one hundred and one in a hill, but none larger thau a walnut. 

 Cabbages, radishes, melons, squashes, and beans have succeeded. My largest ex- 

 perience is with onions from the seed ; the first year, after getting 2 inches high, many 

 turned yellow ou top and finally died; second year they were better, and third year 

 good. 



In regard to manure used: 



In plats as follows: First year, ashes and lime, fresh slaked ; ashes '200 bushels to 

 the acre, lime 2 tons to the acre ; crop failed. Same plat, second year: Heii droppings 

 at the rate of 10 cubic yards per acre, composited with plaster, and just previous to 

 application mixed with twice their bulk of white-ash ashes. Yield, 300 to 400 bushels 

 per acre. Third year: " Garden City phosphate," 1.000 pounds per acre. Yield im- 

 proved. This year (1885; applied nitrate of soda, 150 pounds, "Garden City phos- 

 phate," 800 pounds per acre ; the crop is of fair promise in the main, but there are 

 spots where a good stand has disappeared ; in these barren spots there will be found 

 small patches of fine onions marking the spot of a fire. The original plat, treated this 

 year as above, now (July) promises a fine crop. This year I have taken in new ground 

 with the above stated result. 



The sample was dried to make it more secure when sent through the mail. 



This sample, as the most casual inspection of the analysis will show, 

 contains an enormous amount of organic matter, and to this may be at- 

 tributed the poor success met with in raising crops; as nothing is more 

 injurious than the action of the organic acids, arising from the decay of 

 the organic matter in the soil, on vegetation when they are present in 

 excess. For, however fertile the soil may be in other respects, until 

 this excess of huniic acids is neutralized or otherwise got rid of, the 

 prospect of raising remunerative crops is very slight. The remedy for 

 such a state of affairs is a heavy dressing of lime, from 2 to 5 tons of 

 quicklime per acre, depending on the quantity of organic matter present, 

 that is, from 0.05 to 0.5 per cent., by weight, of the cultivated soil ; the 

 lime or marl used has the power of neutralizing the humic acids. Burn- 

 ing might also be resorted to, but the use of lime will probably, in such 

 cases, prove more beneficial. The lime should be used as a top dress- 

 ing, as it has a strong tendency to sink into the subsoil, and so it should 

 not be plowed in, but kept as near the surface as possible. The 

 ground should be plowed first, then the lime spread and simply har- 

 rowed in. This dose of lime must not be repeated yearly, but at inter- 

 vals of six or eight years 1 to 2 tons of lime made into a compost may 

 be used. It is best applied in the early winter, so that the lime may 

 work into the surface before the spring growth commences. 



The amount of nitrogen and of phosphoric acid is very large, and that 

 of lime, of potash, and soda is abundant for the raising of any crop when 

 the excess of organic acids has been destroyed. With the exception 

 noted the analysis shows this soil to be a very fertile one, containing 

 an abundant supply of all the necessary plant constituents. 



