130 MASSACHUSETTS HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



As to manures, onions are great feeders and like something to 

 select from. I advise applying at least ten cords of barnyard 

 manure per acre, or its equivalent ; farmers in the vicinity of 

 Boston use twent}^ cords of stable manure. But I think it better 

 to use half the quantity of manure, and the other half in com- 

 mercial fertilizers, or, cheaper yet, to use all fertilizer. The latter 

 can be applied at any period of growth, but there is danger 

 from using a phosphate continuously. In Bermuda, the onion 

 growers use part sea manure and part commercial fertilizers. 

 One of m}' neighbors uses ten cords of a mixture of barnyard 

 manure, sea manure, and night-soil, a ver}^ concentrated manure, 

 probably equal to double the quantity of ordinar^^ barnyard 

 manure. I recommend the application of three hundred pounds 

 of nitrate of soda per acre just as the crop begins to bottom ; or, 

 if the crop looks feeble, a complete fertilizer may be used. In all 

 farming a good deal of manure seems to be misapplied, and I 

 suggest the use of less manure and more of commercial fertilizer. 



In a crop of 700 bushels of onions there will be 58 lbs. of 

 potash and 53 lbs. of phosphoric acid. A cord of average stable 

 manure, weighing 4,500 lbs., will contain IS lbs. of potash and 

 22 lbs. of phosphoric acid, and 20 cords would contain 360 lbs. of 

 the former and 440 of the latter. If this quantit}' of manure is 

 applied every year for twenty-five years we shall have put into 

 the soil 9,000 lbs. of potash and 11,000 lbs. of phosphoric acid. 

 But the crop during this time will have contained only 1,450 lbs. 

 of the former and 1,325 of the latter, leaving in the soil an 

 excess of 7,550 lbs. of potash and 9,675 lbs. of phosphoric acid. 

 These substances will, if the laud is ploughed eight inches deep, 

 be distributed through 227 cords of soil per acre, which would 

 give an average of 33 lbs. potash and 42 lbs. phosphoric acid per 

 cord, so that the whole soil would average more than half again 

 as rich in potash as average barn manure (that is, in the propor- 

 tion of 33 to 18), and nearly twice as rich in phosphoric acid (in 

 the proportion of 42 to 22) . This soil itself would have become 

 manure, and as a dressing for grass land would be worth half as 

 much again as barn manure. On such land I suggest using no 

 barn manure, and nitrogen onh' in forms that will meet the wants 

 of the crop as it comes along. This should be done two or three 

 times during its growth. 



There are three classes of seed-sowers — the finger-stirrers, 



