333 



by the rain wvter, yet it loses a large quantity by the drainage water, 

 whicli is, of course, richer in nitrogen than the rain. In 188() and 

 JS87 Bertlelot determined by measurement that the nitrogen carried 

 from th<' soil by drainage water is nearly ten times that brought to 

 the soil by rain water. It is therefore economical to return this 

 tlraiuage water to the field, as far as possible, and thus return 

 with it the nitrogen which has at great expense been given, in the 

 shape of fertilizers, to the field by the farmer. (Agr. Sci., VoL III, 

 p. 35.) 



MISSOURI. 



Dr. P. Schweitzer, of the Missouri Agricultural Experiment Sta- 

 tion, publishes in Bulletin No. IX an elaborate study of the chemical 

 changes that go on in the various parts of the maize plant at differ- 

 ent stages of growth. The plant takes up nearly all the ash ingre- 

 dients during the first stages of growth. The more ash constituents 

 a plant takes up over and above its needs the quicker is its develop- 

 ment finished and the smaller is the crop. The young plant takes up 

 nitrogen with extraordinary avidity, and contains a considerable 

 quantity of it. The crop of corn from an acre of land removes there- 

 from 219 pounds of ash and 135 pounds of nitrogen. The ears in 

 this crop alone contain 52 pounds of ash and 86 pounds of nitrogen. 

 (Agr. Sci., Vol. IV, p. 84.) 



PENNSYLVANIA. 



The relation between meteorological conditions and the develop- 

 ment of corn is elaborately presented by Messrs. Frear and Caldwell 

 in the annual report for 1888 of the Pennsylvania State College 

 Agricultural Experiment Station, at Harrisburg, Pa. By testing 

 samples of corn at various stages of its growth we obtain not only 

 some idea of the nature of the changes going on in the plant under the 

 influence of the climate and soil, but the records of past seasons on a 

 given variety at a given locality should give us the means of approxi- 

 mately estimating what will be the crop of the present year. For 

 instance, the loss or gain of dry matter is shown in the following 

 table for one variety of corn out of many that were tested at the 

 Pennsylvania Station. 



Dry ircif/ht in 1 acre of several varieties of corn at diffrmit stafjrs of proicth. 



