144 CROP GROWING AND CROP FEEDING 



if manure enough is raised to cover the corn tend. While the demands of 

 the tobacco crop for nitrogen and potash can only be fully met by the use of 

 a complete fertilizer, we should endeavor to lessen the amount needed, by the 

 growing of legumes and the accumulation of humus in the soil. But, at 

 the same time, any parsimony in the use of fertilizers when needed will result 

 in loss to the tobacco grower, since only by the most liberal feeding can the 

 maximum crops in quality and quantity be produced. Hence the tobacco crop, 

 instead of being an impoverishment to the farm, can be made, by the sys- 

 te.matic rotation of crops and the liberal application of fertilizers, the means 

 for its rapid improvement. 



FORMS OF FERTILIZERS FOR TOBACCO. 



While heavy fertilization is needed for the tobacco crop, there is no crop 

 more sensitive to the shape in which the plant food is presented to it. Nitro- 

 gen and potash are its chief needs. But it is not merely potash that is 

 needed, for it is essential that it be free from chlorides ; hence only the high 

 grade sulphate should be used. The muriate will make a heavier crop, but 

 a crop of inferior value, and, in fact, a crop worthless for manufacturing 

 where it is to be burned in pipe, cigarette or cigar. A year or so ago I gave 

 the tobacco formula, already printed, to a farmer in the bright tobacco belt 

 of North Carolina. He wrote afterwards that his crop was of very poor 

 quality, and he wanted to know what was the matter with the fertilizer. He 

 bought the materials from a large firm of fertilizer makers in Norfolk, and 

 he sent me their bill. Where I had designated high grade sulphate of potash 

 they had put in low grade, or kainit. In the bill was charged "sulphate of 

 potash/' and then, in small letters in bracket, "kainit." It was evidently 

 done for the purpose of disgusting the farmer with home mixed fertilizers, 

 for any manufacturer knows that kainit should never be used in a tobacco 

 fertilizer. The cause of the poor quality of his tobacco was plain. 



Then, too, the form in which the nitrogen is presented is of some im- 

 portance. We have found that a moderate amount of nitrate of soda, as a 

 starter, and a good supply of organic nitrogen in the form of dried blood, 

 have given better results than cotton seed meal or fish scrap. Fish scrap is 

 apt to contain some chlorides, and is objectionable. Tankage might do if 

 it was pure meat tankage and not largely mixed with bone ; but the character 

 of the tankage is too uncertain for reliance. Any excess of phosphoric acid 

 tends to render the tobacco "bony," as it is called, or thick veined, with a 

 thin, papery leaf, lacking body. The formula we have given is the result 

 of long study and experimentation with various mixtures, and we believe it 



