1906.] Manuring the Mangold Crop. 27 



pamphlet that contains them is at the disposal of any farmer on 

 application. 



The Use of Farmyard Manure Alone. — If land is in good 

 " heart," and especially if it is the custom to top-dress the straw 

 crop that succeeds mangolds, it is often possible to grow nearly 

 a full crop of the latter by using about 20 tons of dung with- 

 out any addition. As a rule, however, it will pay better to 

 use less dung for this crop, and to employ the surplus on some 

 other crop of the farm, supplementing the dung by means of 

 some artificial dressing. 



The Use of Artificial Manure Alone. — Although very large 

 crops of mangolds can be grown without any farmyard manure, 

 this course would be justifiable only under very exceptional 

 circumstances. The system might, however, be warranted on 

 outlying fields, or in the case of a farm favourabl)- situated for 

 the sale of straw, but in any case the crop succeeding the man- 

 golds (unless it were barley) would seldom give a satisfactory 

 yield without the direct use on it of a considerable amount of 

 artificials. Speaking generally, if artificials are alone depended 

 on for the mangolds they should be ample in amount and 

 should contain all of the three important substances : nitrogen, 

 phosphates, and potash. Of these, most attention should be 

 given to the nitrogen, the bulk of which should be derived from 

 nitrate of soda. This manure, in the great majority of cases, 

 acts much better than sulphate of ammonia on the crop under 

 consideration. It is only in districts where the rainfall is heavy 

 that the latter manure may largely replace the nitrate. Organic 

 nitrogen, in the form of rape dust, blood meal, fish meal, dis- 

 solved bones, &c., often acts well in the absence of dung, and if 

 these manures can be obtained at a reasonable price they may 

 form a proportion of the mixture, and especially on the lighter 

 classes of soil. Without dung nitrate of soda may be used up 

 to 5 cwt. per acre, though 3 cvvt. will usually suffice, or the half 

 may be replaced by a corresponding outlay on one or other or 

 several of the manures just mentioned. 



In the majority of cases superphosphate will furnish the most 

 suitable form of phosphoric acid, 5 or 6 cwt. per acre being as 

 much as will usually prove profitable. Basic slag does not 

 generally prove a satisfactory substitute for superphosphate for 



