1904.] PUBLIC DOCLTMEXT — No. 38. 139 



hiirrowod in. The kinds :uul the amounts per acre arc as 

 follows : — 



Nitrate of soda, KiO pounds, furnishing nitrogen. 



Dissolved hone-hlaek, '.ViO pounds, furnishing pliosplioric aeid. 



Muriate of potash, 1(50 ])ounds, furnishing potash. 



Land plaster, 400 pounds. 



Lime, 400 pounds. 



Manure, 5 cords. 



^•1. — /Soil Test with Corn {South Acre). 

 This acre has been used in soil tests lor fifteen years, bejjfin- 

 ning in 1889. The cro})S in successive years have been as 

 follows : corn, corn, oats, ijrass and clover, grass and clover, 

 corn (followed by mustard as a catch crop) , rye, soy beans, 

 w'hite mustard, corn, corn, grass and clover, gi'ass and clover, 

 corn , and corn . Since 1889 this field has therefore borne seven 

 corn crops, and during this time it has been four years in grass. 

 The crop last year Avas corn, following grass ; this year, corn 

 folloW'S corn. The season Avas the most unfavorable for this 

 crop which has been known within the lifetime of most men 

 now living, and the crop of this year was exceedingly poor, 

 even on the land which has for fifteen years received an 

 annual a})plication of manure at the rate of 5 cords per acre. 

 Last vear, althouijh the season then also was somewhat unfa\'- 

 orable, this plot gave a yield almost double that of this year. 

 It is not surprising, therefore, that the yield on most of the 

 ])lots receiving fertilizers was very low. Four of the plots 

 have received neither manure nor fertilizer throughout the 

 entire fifteen Acars, and these now show a degree of exhaus- 

 tion amounting to almost absolute sterility. Allowing 90 

 pounds of ears as husked to the bushel of shelled grain, the 

 average product of these plots was at the rate of about 1^- 

 bushels to the acre. The average yield of stover on these 

 plots is at the rate of 560 })ounds ])er acre. Tln^ table show^s 

 the manuring of the several ])lots, the rate of yield, and the 

 gain or loss per acre compared wath the nothing plots : — 



