of Manures Applied to Pasture. 



33 



entirely obtained by close bottom clover herbage, which 

 hardly gave room for top grass to get away." 



If we examine the figures obtained from the use of 5 cwt. 

 basic slag at. Sevington (a) on Plot 4, during the two seasons 

 (190 1 -2) that followed its application to land that had not 

 been limed, and (b) on Plot 2, during the two seasons (1908-9) 

 that followed its application to land that had been limed 

 some six years earlier, we find that under the latter conditions 

 the effects of the slag are much greater. Under the 

 circumstances indicated by (a) the live weight gain was 

 6 + 46=52 lb., while under the circumstances indicated by 

 (b) they were 93 + 90=183 lb. The natural character of the 

 two pairs of seasons concerned was not sufficiently different 

 to account for the great difference in the effect of the manure, 

 so that we must seek an explanation in another direction. 

 The difference might be due to the fact that six years previously 

 a moderate dose of lime had been applied to the land, and 

 that, in some way, this had created conditions unusually 

 favourable to the action of Basic Slag. It would certainly 

 be very unexpected if, on a chalky soil, the addition of 4 tons 

 of burned lime made any great difference to the soil-conditions. 

 We shall see later (p. 48) that ij tons of ground quicklime 

 per acre were used at Cockle Park, Sevington, and Cransley 

 on a plot that also received superphosphate, and that at 

 Sevington this lime produced a perfectly insignificant increase 

 in live-weight, only, in fact, 33 lbs. in nine years. There are, 

 therefore, no indications, from the evidence forthcoming at 

 Sevington, that the lime has had any material influence on 

 the striking results obtained from the use of Basic Slag in 

 June. The records of the Cransley experiments give strong 

 support to this conclusion. At the end of the sixth season 

 at that station 10 cwt. of Basic Slag was applied to Plot 2, 

 which, as at Sevington, had got 4 tons per acre of lime for 

 the first year of the experiment. The effects in the next two 

 seasons (1907-8) are represented by the production of 

 33 + 53 = 86 lbs. live-weight increase beyond Plot 6 (the 

 continuously unmanured plot). On comparing the effects 

 of 10 cwt. Basic Slag when used at the beginning of the 

 experiments on Plot 3, it is found that in the two immediately 

 succeeding years (1901-2) the live-weight gain was 41+86 = 

 127 lbs. In the case of Cransley, therefore, where the slag 



