358 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



Chemically Prepared Leather Refuse. 



(Sent on from Boston, Mass.) 



Per cent. 



Moisture at 100° C, 8.00 



Nitrogen, 8.50 



Ash constituents, 78 



The substance was well ground, and of a dark brown 

 color, similar to dried blood. Five hundred parts of water 

 abstracted, at 18° to 20° C, 6.09 parts of soluble matter. 

 The dissolved mass contained but traces of nitrogenous 

 material. Heated with water to the boiling point it became 

 soft like rubber, and turned brittle again after cooling. The 

 above sample was sent on by a Boston manufacturer of fer- 

 tilizers, accompanied by a statement that it was obtained 

 from a party in Worcester, and was offered in the early part 

 of the season at $5.50 per ton in Boston ; its price had ad- 

 vanced in the month of May to fifteen dollars per ton. The 

 material consisted of leather scraps which apparently had 

 been treated with high-pressed steam for the abstraction of 

 fat, and was thereby altered into a semi-carbonized or crispy 

 mass. Judging from a series of samples subsequently received 

 through the Secretary of the Board, its nitrogen percentage 

 varies from 5.89 to 8.50. (See First Report of Agric. 

 Experiment Stat., 1882.) 



The low price of this animal refuse matter as compared 

 with that of dried blood, ground meat, etc., has evidently 

 served as an incentive to use it in place of the latter, as a 

 nitrogen source in the manufacture of fertilizers. I am 

 informed that from four to five thousand tons of this sub- 

 stance have been sold in and about Boston for that purpose 

 during the past year. Baltimore is mentioned as a consumer in 

 former years. As actual experiments in the field tend to prove 

 that merely ground-up leather refuse of any description is even 

 inferior in its action as a nitrogen source, on plant-growth, to 

 born shavings, it seems advisable in the interest of farmers 

 and of manufacturers of fertilizers, not only to discourage 

 its use, but to restrict, as far as practicable, its introduction 

 as a nitrogen source into the important class of fertilizers 

 commonly known as " Ammoniated Phosphates," by obliging 

 the manufacturer to make known, in some conspicuous 



