AND HORTICULTUI^AL REGISTER. 



PUBLISHED BY JOSEPH BRECK & CO., NO. 52 NORTH MARKET STREET, (Aor.coi.tobal Warehouse.^^ALLEN PUTNAM, EDITOR. 



VOL. XIX.] 



BOSTON, WEDNESDAY EVENING, APRIL 14, 1841. 



[NO. 41. 



N. E. FARMER 



NITRATE OF SODA AS A MANURE. 



This article has recently been applied to the 

 soil in I'lngiand. In some instiiiices its effects up- 

 on vegetation have been highly favorable. In otli- 

 er cases it has failed. The last No. of the Jonrnal 

 of the Royal Agricultural Society of England, con- 

 tains the statements of sixteen different individuals 

 in relation to the use and effects of this article. 

 Several farmers in this vicinity have been recently 

 obtaining it, and its efl^ects in this State will be as- 

 certained in part the coming season. We have ob- 

 tained a small quantity for our own use, and intend 

 to watch its operations upon different soils and dif- 

 ferent crops. Its cost is about .$4 per cwt. We 

 give below extracts from the English journal, 

 flir Pusey, President of the Society, says : 



"With all proper abatements, the nitrate appears 

 to be a very promising manure ; and fortunately 

 we need not apprehend that, as with bones and 

 with some other artificial manures, the increase of 

 its use should so raise its price as aln;ost to absorb 

 the profit of its employment ; for the supply of it 

 from the c.\tensive beds which lie near the surface 

 in Peru must be as inexhaustible, for centuries at 

 least, as that of coals. This ample supply, as well 

 as its easy carriage, increase its importance, and 

 render it the more desirable that we should ascer- 

 tain the causes of its success and its failure. At 

 present the nitrate appears most capricious in its 

 operation ; but it is not, of course. Nature who is 

 variable, but we who are ignorant." 



"An objection has been made to the use of the 

 nitrate, that its effect lasts for one year only. If 

 it brings back its own cost, however, in the year, 

 the objection is not just, at least when it is applied 

 to grass ; for we must not forget that an increase 

 of food for stock once raised on grass land by any 

 fresh means, is a new capital created, which cir- 

 culates between the stock and the land, givino- 

 more dung to the soil, and, again, more food to the 

 additional animals which are maintained on that 

 soil, for as many years as the farm continues to be 

 well managed. Whether it exhaust a soil by in- 

 creasing the crop of grain, is a more difficult ques- 

 tion, whicli cannot be answered without further 

 olidcrvalion. But the investigation of its effects is, 

 I til ink, as likely to advance scientific as practical 

 farming. Hitherto manures have been classed 

 rather loosely as real or nutritious manures, such 

 as dung, and stimulating manures, such as lime and 

 other minerals ; which last are supposed not to sup- 

 port the plant directly by affording it food, but in- 

 directly, by exciting other substances, that are thus 



rendered capable of giving nourishment to it 



German writers, however, now maintain that dung 

 itself acts not by any power which it possesses as 

 having formerly been a part of living bodies, ani- 

 mal or vegetable, but as uniting those chemical 

 elements, some of them mineral, which constitute 

 the food of plants ; and that a compound of these 

 f!'-':;!eul?, artificially brought together, would act 

 precisely in the same manner as dung. Dr. Liebig, 



who is regarded as the first living authority on or- 

 ganic chemistry, maintains this view in the impor- 

 tant work he has just published on "Chemistry in 

 its application to Agriculture," and goes far to 

 prove it. This is, in fact, the great qnestinn, if it 

 still be a question, in agricultural chemistry. But 

 the substance we are considering throws, I think, 

 some light on this point and on the operation of 

 other manures. It is now admitted that the most 

 active principle of farm-yard dung, is the urine that 

 is mixed in it. When this urine, which is the 

 liquid manure of the Flemings, is applied to grow- 

 ing crops as a top-dressing, it gives a dark color 

 to the grasses (including those grasses which bear 

 grain, that is, common corn ;) it has a tendency to 

 lengthen, but weaken the straw— to increase the 



the manure lo which you have called our attention 

 its efi'ijcts in this neighborhood have certainly borne 

 out the doubts which you e.vpressed. It seems to 

 me that wo should all try if, since it is of undoubt- 

 ed efficacy in many cases, but not on a large scale 

 at first, unless we know that it has acted well on 

 the particular soil and crop we v.-ish to benefit, be- 

 cause its cost is considerable, and it sometimes 

 fails altogether." 



bulk, but diminish the weight, of the grain. I 

 need not remind yon that this liquid, when putri- 

 fied, contains much ammonia : soot, I believe, acts 

 in the same manner, and also contains much am- 

 monia. The refuse liquor of gas works was men- 

 tioned in the first No. of our Journal as producing 

 the same dark color and active growth in barley. 

 I have tried it this year in consequence, and found 

 it to act in the same manner on carrots. The 

 [Chief ingredient of this liquor is also ammcmia, as 

 may be perceived by its pungent smell. It appears 

 clear, therefore, that one active principle of these 

 three very diff'erent manures is that substance in 

 which they agree, namely, ammonia. But the ni- 

 trate of soda enables us, I think, to go a step fur- 

 ther. Ammonia is a combination of nitrogen with 

 hydrogen: either of these might be the source of 

 its power over vegetation ; but Ave have seen that 

 saltpetre, or nitrate of potash, and cubic saltpetre, 

 or nitrate of soda, act upon crops in the same pe- 

 culiar manner with fermented urine, with soot, and 

 with gas liquor. These last, however, do not con- 

 tain hydrogen, and so difl^er from the other three, 

 but they agree with them in containing nitrogen in 

 the form of nitric acid. Nitrogen appears, then, 

 to be the active principle of the five substances. — 

 Dr. Liebig, in proving the efficacy of ammonia as a 

 manure, has shown the necessity of nitrogen for 

 forming the most nutritious part of our vegetable 

 tood, such as gluten, which nitrogen again appears 

 as a most essential element of all animal frames. 

 It is possible, however, that where a large portion 

 of nitrogen is applied to wheat crops as manure, 

 gluten may be produced in excess; and that the 

 wheat may be deficient on the other hand, in some 

 essential element, sur^h as lime. According to Dr. 

 Liebig's principles, we should be able to remedy 

 this defect by applying lime at the same time in 

 such a state as would be readily absorbed by the 

 plant. I mention this, however, rather as an ex- 

 emplification of those principles than as a practical 

 suggestion. But having been led almost too far 

 into this subject, I will only express the hope, that 

 men of science who are competent to do it justice, 

 may be disposed to assist us by investigating the 

 operation of manures and the food of plants. I 

 cannot but think that wo are on the eve of impor- 

 tant discoveries in'this department of theoretical 

 agriculture. With regard to the practical use of 



Mr John Alderson, Bailiff" of the Earl of Zetland, 

 says : 



" Nine ridges ia a meadow belonging to tlie 

 Earl of Zetland, were sown with nitrate on or 

 about the 1st of August, 18.39. Two of the same 

 ridges, with the remaining part of the meadow, 

 were sown with nitrate of soda on the 13th of May, 

 1840. The best grass this year was on the tw'o 

 ridges sown with nitrate of soda twice, that ia in 

 August and again in May, the second-best that 

 part which was sown in May, and the worst was 

 that part which was sown in August, 1639. This 

 shows that nitrate of soda has a little effect tiie 

 second year, but not much. 



" The Earl of Zetland's farming-man at Marskc 

 Farm, in returning home from sowmg nitrate of 

 soda on wheat, grass, &c., found in one of the 

 sacks a small quantity left, and, being desirous not 

 to waste it, took the trouble of going into a poor 

 man's cottage-ground, where was growing a small 

 ridge of wheat. This small quantity of nitrate of 

 soda was sown on one end of the ridge. In a.few 

 days, to the great astonishment of the poor man, 

 he saw so great a change, both in color and size, 

 that he called together his neighbors to see if they 

 could find out the cause; but as neither he nor his 

 neighbors could make it out, they returned home 

 satisfied to wait till the secret was revealed. 



" A respectable farmer in the neighborhood of 

 Marske, who had used a little nitrate of soda last 

 summer, gives his opinion that he had not reaped 

 or seen the benefit reported. On making inquiry 

 it appeared that only 1 cwt. per acre had been ap- 

 plied : this agrees with my opinion, that not less 

 than 1 1.2 cwt. should be sown, and I am rather 

 inclined to say more. 



" Nitrate of soda may be sown on pasture to a 

 good eflTect, particularly on pasture that does not 

 eat off" regularly ; but the farmer will not see the 

 good efli"ect without minuie observation, as the cat- 

 tle eat the grass as it grows. 



'•Two fields belonging to the Earl of Zetland, 

 at Upleatham, were sown with clover in 1839; in 

 1840, one of the said fields was sown with nitrate 

 of soda, and had a good effect. Alter the clover 

 was cut, in the course of the week, the nitrate evi- 



dently showed itself in the fog or after-grass 



During the months of August and September, the 

 two fields of clover-fog were depastured with cat- 

 tle and sheep. The field sown with nitrate of so- 

 da was eaten by the cattle and sheep regularly 

 away. The field not sown with nitrate of soda 

 was left by the cattle in tufts or hots, not eaten 

 regularly off". This evidently shows that nitrate 

 of soda has the eff"ect of sweetening the grass." 



