186 MASSACHUSETTS HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



had never used it in fruit-growing. He mixes his fertilizers to suit 

 different crops, using more potash for potatoes, and less nitrogen, 

 than for cabbages or onions. 



Major Henr}' Emery spoke of the effect of an excess of ammonia 

 on the seeding of plants. It will give a hu-ge crop of fodder from 

 corn, but the ears do not kernel out, and the same is the case with 

 other plants. Corn wants phosplioric acid and potash, 



Mr. Gregory said that he used fifty tons of fertilizers last year, 

 which was but a small part of the whole quantity of manure used 

 b\' him. He applied to corn, first active ammonia and afterwards 

 something to perfect the seed. Corn does not need a great deal 

 of nitrogen, — two per cent is enough, — but it wants a good deal of 

 phosphoric acid. He thought a mixture of ammonia from different 

 sources — the greater the number the better — was preferable to 

 that from onl}' one source. He did not wish to give the idea that 

 plants want a great deal of ammonia. 



Leander Wetherell thought nitrogenous manures, at the price 

 they command in the market, too expensive to be purchased 

 by farmers. He had tried superphosphate on good coin land, 

 and found it better without than with ammonia. The corn was 

 measured in baskets, and one basket was weighed, and the prod- 

 uce was sevent}' bushels of shelled corn to the acre, and a friend 

 of his from Ohio said he never saw better corn there. The free 

 application of ammonia tends to produce too much foliage and too 

 little grain. A gentleman in Worcester got, in this way, an im- 

 mense growth of wheat straw, but not enough grain to pay for 

 threshing. Professor Atwater found that in man}' parts of Con- 

 necticut the soil did not need nitrogen.' The only real question in 

 regard to fertilizers is, whether farmers can afford to use them. 

 They work well in connection with stable manure ; superphosphate 

 will make corn ten or fifteen days earlier than if it is not used, — 

 a very important consideration in frost}' seasons. The best course 

 for farmers is to buy the constituents of fertilizers and mix for them- 

 selves. 



Major Emery had used night-soil on corn, and got an immense 

 quantity of fodder, but little grain. He had also used it on 

 timothy grass, five hundred cubic feet of which, by measurement, 

 is called a ton, but, treated with a large quantity of night-soil, it 

 will give a thick bottom of short fodder, with little or no head, and 

 will require six hundred and fifty cubic feet to the ton ; being de- 

 ficient in the elements of mineral weight, which is given to the stalks 



