176 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. [Pub. Doc. 



may answer for the later ones, because nature will have 

 time before they need to feed upon it to w^ork it over and 

 convert it into the form of nitrates. 



I am tempted to say one thing more about corn. I want 

 to call your attention to a set of photographs that I showed 

 to a few of you this morning. I am more and more amazed, 

 the longer I continue experiments with the corn crop, to 

 note the very close dependence of this crop on all soils, not 

 simply on the Amherst soils but on all soils, upon a liberal 

 supply of available potash. I am further more and more 

 amazed, the longer I experiment with corn, to note the extent 

 to which it can make an excellent crop, although you do not 

 apply to the soil much nitrogen in any form. I have a series 

 of photographs showing this in a marked degree. One illus- 

 trates the growth of a crop on one-twentieth of an acre. On 

 one of the plots in this field, during eleven years we had 

 applied only muriate of potash and dissolved bone-black in 

 moderate amounts, one hundred and sixty pounds of the 

 former and three hundred and twenty pounds of the latter to 

 the acre. We had a magnificent crop of corn on that plot. 

 It amounted to about sixty bushels of shelled corn to the 

 acre ; it was almost as good a crop as was produced on an- 

 other plot in the same field where every year for the eleven 

 years we have applied five cords of barn-yard manure. Why 

 is this? It is another generalization. Corn is a crop that 

 does not make very heavy demands on the nitrogen suppl}' 

 until hot weather. It does not grow very fast until into 

 July. Previous to that time, nature has worked over the 

 organic stores of nitrogen in the soil and made it into 

 nitrates, and the corn can depend on that to a great extent. 

 Some have wondered if corn is not able to take that second 

 step into the air and get nitrogen. Perhaps it can. I do 

 not know. The crops that make their chief growth in the 

 latter part of the season do not need to have as much nitro- 

 gen supplied to them as others. 



Corn grown under the right conditions is one of the most 

 splendid crops we can grow in this country. I heartily agree 

 with the sentiment that corn is the very best gift of God to 

 the American people. I sometimes wonder if there is not 

 considerable room for improvement in the way in which you 



