128 MASSACHUSETTS HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



but still a considerable quantity, — so much that it will heat in a 

 cask. 



A. W. Cheever had composted fine steamed bone with ashes as 

 described bj- previous speakers. It evolved a great heat and a 

 disagreeable smell, and he covered it with loam. He applied it to 

 pasture laud, and the grass was improved, but whether profitably 

 or not he could not say. A dealer in chemical fertilizers told him 

 that, if potash alcnc is wanted, muriate or sulphate is cheapest. 



Major Emery was still of the opinion, though the President dif- 

 fered from him, that a very fine, sandy soil will not retain potash, 

 but if vegetable matter is ploughed in, the soil will hold the potash. 

 Some soils will hold whatever is put into them. He had reduced 

 bones bj' placing them in a pit and putting potash over them, and 

 covering with two feet of loam. In this way he got his bone pure. 

 The mixture was applied to cabbages with good results. In 

 steamed bones three per cent of the nitrogen is lost. It is true 

 that the ashes of asparagus have a large proportion of potash, but, 

 like all plants that grow quickly, asparagus makes very little ashes. 

 Poplar wood ashes have a larger percentage of potash than oak 

 wood ashes, but the slowly growing oak makes more ashes than 

 the quickly growing poplar. 



W. H. Hills said that he had tried the experiment of dis- 

 solving whole bones and succeeded, though a chemist said he could 

 not do it. He first tried sulphuric acid, and burnt his fingers and 

 his pocket. If a half-hogshead is used, and there is a nail driven 

 through it, the acid will eat the nail and leak out. He recom- 

 mended a wooden vat, made like those used by cider-makers, with- 

 out any metal. His greatest trouble'is to get wood ashes. He 

 sometimes tempts the pedler of soap to leave his load with him, 

 and if he set out to collect ashes, would take soap to pay for them 

 in preference to cash. Canada ashes are good if pure. A neigh- 

 bor of his gets them pure, but they come rather high, — about 

 thirty-three cents per bushel. Dr. Nichols says that ashes will 

 cut or saponify finely ground bones in a few hours, and that it is 

 not necessar}' to spend two or three weeks, and there would be a 

 saving in ammonia as well as in time. Some scientific men say 

 that plaster drives off ammonia, but Dr. Nichols says it does not. 

 The speaker uses bone and wood ashes as he does stable manure — 

 all he can get. He thought bone and ashes should be applied in 

 the fall, or in very early spring, to have the effect show the first 

 year. The second crop is often benefited more than the first. It 



