COMMERCIAL FERTILIZER CONTINUED 2O"" 



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fered for sale. Eighty-three manufacturers placed 

 six hundred and forty-four brands on the market in 

 New York State during the same year. Of one 

 hundred and twenty brands registered for sale in 

 Vermont in the spring of 1904, there were seventeen 

 mixtures for corn and thirty-four for potatoes. 



The result of this is more or less confusion on the 

 part of the farmer in purchasing fertilizers, and with 

 many a farmer it is a lottery as to whether or not 

 he is buying what his crop or his soil needs. 



Some of the manufacturers are not above using 

 poor, low grade, raw materials in making these 

 mixtures. 



This means that the farmer should make himself 

 familiar with the subject of fertilizers if he desires 

 to use them intelligently and economically. 



Safeguard for the farmer. 



As a safeguard to the buyer of fertilizers the 

 State laws require that every brand put on the mar- 

 ket shall be registered and that every bag or pack- 

 age sold shall have stated on it an analysis showing 

 the amounts of nitrogen, or its equivalent in am- 

 monia, the soluble phosphoric acid, the reverted 

 phosphoric acid, the insoluble phosphoric acid, and 

 the potash. 



This registration is generally made at the State 

 experiment station, and the director of the station 

 is instructed to take samples of these brands and 

 have them analyzed, and publish the results together 

 with the analysis guaranteed by the maker. 



These analyses are published in bulletin form and 



