Fertilisers for Market Garden Crops. 473 



tons per acre when a heavy dressing of dung was used. By supple- 

 menting the light dressing of dung, however, with phosphates 

 and nitrate of soda, the crop was increased to y\ tons per acre 

 when 2 cwt. of nitrate per acre were applied, to 8| tons when 

 4 cwt. of nitrate were applied, and to 9 tons when 6 cwt. of 

 nitrate were applied. 



Potash had very little effect upon the crop except when dung 

 was omitted altogether. 



Winter spinach [was fgrown in two years after the removal 

 of the summer spinach without extra manure. The best crops 

 were obtained from the plots yielding the best crops of summer 

 spinach. The difference between the yield of the lightly-dunged 

 plot and that of the best chemical plot in 1898 was about 

 5^ tons of winter spinach per acre, and in 1901 nearly 8^ tons 

 per acre. Probably at least 50 tons of dung per acre would 

 have been necessary to yield anything like these results. 



Beetroots. 



This crop, during the dry seasons we have gone through, has 

 been a good deal affected by drought. Possibly for this reason the 

 heavily dunged plot has done nearly as well as any of the plots 

 on which a light dressing of dung has been supplemented by 

 chemical fertilisers, but the expense of the heavy dung neces- 

 sary to obtain this result has been considerably greater than the 

 expense of manuring with a light dressing of dung combined 

 with chemical fertilisers. 



Our general suggestion for the manuring of beetroots would 

 be the use of a light dressing of town dung, from 4 cwt. to 6 cwt. 

 of superphosphate, and 4 cwt. of nitrate of soda per acre, 

 2 cwt. of the nitrate being applied shortly after the plant is up, 

 and a further 2 cwt. per acre as a top-dressing a month or so 

 afterwards. If, however, the crop is not grown with dung, it 

 would be well to give also 4 cwt. of kainit (or 1 cwt. of sulphate 

 of potash) per acre, sown some time before the preparation 

 of the seed bed, and in this case a third top-dressing of nitrate 

 of soda may be given. According to our experience, potash 

 will not generally be found necessary where dung is directly 

 applied. 



