NATURE 



317 



THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 26, 1874 



THE ROTHAMSTED AGRICULTURAL 

 INVESTIGA TIONS 



XT has become a trite remark, that while both the 

 progress and teaching of Science are fostered in most 

 educated countries by the care of the State, they mainly 

 depend in our own country on the exertions of private 

 individuals ; this fact is perhaps, however, more strikingly 

 seen in the case of agriculture than in any other instance. 

 The traveller in Germany will find scattered over the 

 country, some forty Experimental Stations and Agri. 

 cultural Academies, establishments which are devoted to 

 the investigation and teaching of scientific agriculture 

 and arc maintained by their respective States. The 

 German farmer has thus the means of becoming 

 acquainted with the true science of his business, and 

 provision is at the same time made for the investigation 

 of the various problems with which his work abounds. 

 In England the state of things is, alas, wholly different. 

 We have just one college — that at Cirencester, devoted to 

 the teaching of scientific agriculture, and one Experi- 

 mental Station — that at Rothamsted. There is indeed 

 some experimental work done by local Farmers' Clubs, 

 but this is generally only with the object of comparing 

 the effects of the various manures that are in the market, 

 and with no scientific aim or result. Yet England pre- 

 eminently needs the help of Science to direct economi- 

 cally her vast system of agriculture. The art of agri. 

 culture is here in a higher state of development than on 

 the continent. More capital is here invested in the 

 land ; more attention has been paid to tillage, to arti- 

 ficial manures, and to the breeding and feeding of stock. 

 The British farmer succeeds because he is a practical 

 man, and has good common sense, and the enterprising 

 spirit of his race ; what might he not do if he thoroughly 

 understood the principles which underlie his art .' 



If we have but one agricultural station in England we 

 have at least reason to be proud of it. The work done at 

 Mr. Lawes' estate at Rothamsted is not to be ecjualled by 

 that of any of the foreign stations ; indeed, in several 

 departments of investigation it might safely challenge a 

 comparison with their united efforts. This excellence has 

 arisen from the systematic and thorough manner in which 

 the subjects taken up have been treated. We cannot better 

 illustrate this than by referring to the last contribution from 

 Rothamsted, a report by Messrs. Lawes and Gilbert on 

 the growth of barley.* 



In one of the experimental fields barley has been grown 

 for twenty years, and the experiment is still progressing. 

 The field is divided into plots of about one-fifth of an 

 acre ; some of these have never received any manure 

 during the twenty years ; the others receive some one or 

 more of the food constituents which barley requires. Thus 

 one is manured with phosphates, a second with alkalies, 

 a third with ammonia, a fourth with ammonia and );ho5- 

 phates, a fifth with ammonia, phosphates, and alkalies, 

 &c. The same manures are always applied each year to 

 the same plot. At harvest the crops are carefully weighed, 



* ''Report of Experiments on the Growth of Barley for twenty ye.irs in suc- 

 cession on the same land," by J. B. Lawes, F.R.S., F.C.S., and J. H. 

 Gilbert, Ph.D., F.K.S., V.C.S.—yournalo/ t/u Royetl Agricultural Society, 

 1873, 89 and 275. 



Vol, IX. — No. 226 



and are then analysed in the laboratory under the super- 

 intendence of Dr. Gilbert, the amount of dry matter, ash, 

 and nitrogen being determined. The advantages of this 

 systematic mode of experimenting are very great. Carried 

 on in the same manner for so many years, these experiments 

 answerquestions relating totheexhaustionof soil, to the per- 

 manent effect of manures, to the eflcct of season upon the 

 produce. With the aid of the laboratory investigations 

 they teach us what proportion of the various ingredients 

 supplied in the manure is recovered in the crop, and 

 how the composition of the plant is affected by the 

 various conditions of the soil. In conjunction with ana- 

 lyses of the soil and of the drainage water, we learn what 

 becomes of the manures applied, how deeply they have 

 penetrated into the soil, what is the loss suffered through 

 drainage, &c. A single field experiment thus thoroughly 

 and patiently carried out touches half the domain of 

 agricultural chemistry, and suppUes information of the 

 most solid and valuable kind. 



The value of every trustworthy investigation is in- 

 creased as others are completed which compare with it ; 

 the work at Rothamsted thus derives an additional value 

 from its extent. During the last thirty years Messrs. Lawes 

 and Gilbert have investigated in the manner described all 

 the principal farm crops, experimenting both on each 

 singly, and also on their behaviour when grown in rotation. 

 As the results are gradually published, and we are able 

 to compare the behaviour of different crops grown on the 

 same soil, with the same manures, and in the same sea- 

 sons, the special characteristics of each crop become 

 plainly shown by contrast with its fellows, and we gradu- 

 ally learn the part which each is fitted to play in a scien- 

 tific system of agriculture. 



Nitrogenous manures are of primary importance if 

 luxuriant cereal crops are to be raised, the natural supply 

 of combined nitrogen from the atmosphere being very 

 small, and the crops in question having little power for 

 assimilating the forms of nitrogen chiefly present in the 

 soil. Nitrogenous manures are, moreover, as every farmer 

 knows, very expensive, and it is a matter of great import- 

 ance to employ them in the most economical manner. 

 Messrs. Lawes and Gilbert, knowing the composition of 

 the manure that has gone on to their fields, and the com- 

 position of the crops that have been carted off, can 

 tell e.xactly what proportion of the nitrogen applied has 

 been assimilated by the plant. They find, on an average 

 of twenty years, that wheat assimilates about 45 per cent, 

 of the nitrogen in a spring dressing of nitrate of 

 sodium, and about 33 per cent, in the case of an 

 autumn dressing of sulphate of ammonium, and only 

 14J per cent, of the nitrogen supplied by farm- 

 yard manure. With barley, the proportion assimi- 

 lated is rather greater, being 49 per cent, for a spring 

 dressing of ammonium salts. The question as to what 

 becomes of the large proportion of unused nitrogen is 

 clearly of the highest importance. Analyses of the soils, 

 and of the drainage water, throw much light on the sub- 

 ject. The soils of the wheat field have been analysed 

 down to a depth of 27 inches. A considerable part of 

 the missing nitrogen is found to be actually present in the 

 soil, but since it has scarcely any effect on the crops, it 

 is apparently in some state of combination unsuitable for 

 the plant's use. A still larger portion of the nitro- 



