152 Maine Agricultural Experiment Station. 1919. 



The Fertilizer Law. 



The fertilizer law was amended by the 1919 Legislature. 

 The chief points as effective since July 1919 follow. 



A commercial fertilizer is any material used for fertilizing 

 purposes, the price of which exceeds ten dollars a ton. Each 

 package or lot shall carry a plainly printed statement giving : 

 the number of net pounds in the package ; the n?.me brand or 

 trade mark ; the name and principal address of maker ; and a 

 "chemical analysis stating the minimum percentage of nitrogen, 

 available as plant food, present as nitrates, ammonia salts or 

 organic nitrogen, of potash soluble in water, of phosphoric acid 

 in available form, soluble and reverted, and of total phosphoric 

 acid." All fertilizers must be registered with the Commissioner 

 of Agriculture before being offered for sale. 



A fertilizer is misbranded if : it fails to bear all of the 

 •statements named above; if these statements are not in accord 

 with the certificate filed with the Commissioner of Agriculture; 

 and if the registration fee has not been paid. 



A fertilizer is adulterated "First, if its weight, composi- 

 tion, quality, strength or purity do not conform in each particu- 

 lar to the claims made upon the affixed guaranty. Second, if it 

 contains any material deleterious to growing plants. Third, 

 if it is found to contain any pulverized leather, hair, ground 

 hoofs, horns, wool waste, peat, garbage tankage, cyanamide, or 

 any nitrogenous ingredients derived from any inert material 

 whatsoever, unless the same has been so treated as to be avail- 

 able as plant food as determined by the methods adopted by the 

 association of official agricultural chemists, without an explicit 

 printed statement of the fact, conspicuously affixed to the pack- 

 age of such fertilizer and accompanying and going with every 

 lot or package of the same, in which fertilizer the above named 

 materials aid in making up the required or guaranteed analysis." 



The Commissioner of Agriculture is the executive of the 

 law and the full text of the law will be sent on application to 

 him at the State House, Augusta. 



