28 Soiling. 



elements of which my soil has already an abundance, 

 it would be different. But I do not know that, and 

 have no way of finding it out with any degree of 

 certainty. Therefore I shun the purchase ot com- 

 mercial fertilizers, and put my faith in barnyard 

 manure, which I know, as Professor Atwater says, 

 is a complete fertilizer, and I believe him when he 

 adds, as already quoted : " It improves the texture of 

 the soil, it tends to regulate the supply of moisture, 

 it helps to set free the stores of inherent plant food 

 which every soil contains." 



Next to barnyard manure in point of economy 

 is green manuring, especially when the former is 

 scarce and must be hauled to any great distance. 

 Commercial fertilizers are too expensive for their 

 manurial value, as compared with grain and forage 

 crops plowed under or fed to stock. 



You may take the analysis of any brand of ferti- 

 lizer selling at $30, go through the table of compara- 

 tive values, and pick out a grain or a forage con- 

 taining as high a percentage of nitrogen, phosphoric 

 acid, and potash, that you can buy in the markets 

 for $15 to $20, or which you could grow for less than 

 a quarter of that sum: two tons of clover hay, for 

 instance, that can be bought for, say, $10 per ton, 

 and grown for less than half of that amount, contain 

 nearly as much plant food as a ton of commercial 

 fertilizer that will cost $30. 



If a ton of fertilizer that contains 45 pounds of 

 nitrogen, 200 pounds of phosphoric acid, and 90 

 pounds of potash (which is about the average anal- 



