FORTY-FIRST ANNUAL CONVENTiaN 47 



we should expect the sulphur to give us another $19, or $38. 

 What was the result? The increase where the acid phosphate 

 was used was $19.02, or not quite equal to the other forms. * 



I could give you other field trials, but I know of no field 

 investigation conducted anywhere in the world that justifies the 

 addition of sulphur for its fertilizing value for the production 

 of ordinary farm crops. There is some indication that for the 

 production of some such plants as cabbage, it may have some 

 value, for cabbage seems to need an enormous amount of sul- 

 phur, but for ordinary farm crops, the data seems to be con- 

 clusive that we do not need to consider it. 



The question whether it would be possible to maintain the 

 fertility of the soil in independent dairy farming needs more 

 consideration. In dairy fanxfing there are two primary prod- 

 ucts, the most important one of which is milk. The other is stock, 

 the growing of young stock. If you were to sell a cow of a 

 thousand pounds weight, if she were fat, you would be selling 

 25 pounds of nitrogen, 7 pounds of phosphorus and i pound 

 of potassium. In selling 10,000 pounds of milk, you would 

 sell 57 pounds of nitrogen, 7 pounds of phosphorus and 12 

 pounds of potassium. In selling 25 bushels of wheat, you would 

 sell 36 pounds of nitrogen, 7 pounds of phosphorus and 12 

 pounds of potassium. I am not making these comparisons on 

 an equal money value, but rather making them to show that 

 all of these products carry away some plant food. You realize 

 a thousand pound cow is worth a good deal more than the 

 wheat, but you do sell some plant food, and if you sell fertility, 

 either in cattle from the dairy farm, or in milk, you will have 

 to put it back in some form on ordinary soil. Otherwise the 

 land goes down. 



We can get at the matter in still another way, — find out 

 how much we get back in the excrements when we feed the 

 produce to live stock. Six cows were fed for a considerable 

 length of time at the Illinois Experiment Station. The feed was 

 carefully weighed and analyzed, so as to know exactly what 

 they consumed, and then the excrements were collected, weighed 

 and analyzed, and it was found for every hundred pounds of dry 



