00 JOURNAL OF TITE ROYAL HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



soda alone, being three baskets less than was grown without 

 manure, to G12 baskets per acre obtained by farmyard manure. 

 There was a considerable decline of fruit again in 1891, a result 

 doubtless due in part to the exceedingly large production in the 

 previous year, but also to climatal influences. 



Tho total yield of peaches for the five years was, without 

 manure, 558 baskets per acre; with nitrate of soda alone 

 587 baskets, that is sixteen baskets less than was obtained with- 

 out manure, showing that the trees with nitrogenous manure 

 alone produced wood and luxuriance of foliage rather than matu- 

 ration and yield of fruit. Superphosphate alone gave 940 baskets 

 per acre, a marked increase over the unmanured plot, or over 

 No. 2 with nitrate of soda, without minerals ; muriate of potash 

 alone raised the yield of peaches to double that obtained either 

 without manure or with nitrate of soda. Thus, mineral manures, 

 supplying potash and phosphoric acid, tend very largely to the 

 encouragement of fruit buds, and to the production of fruit — in 

 other words, to maturation ; while nitrogenous manures favour 

 luxuriance of growth and plant-cell formation. 



A combination of nitrate of soda and superphosphate pro- 

 duced in the five years 1,235 baskets of peaches, a similar 

 quantity being grown on plot 7 with superphosphate and potash 

 without nitrogen. But when a mixture of superphosphate, 

 potash, and nitrate of soda was given, a total produce of 1,472 

 baskets of fruit was harvested. The highest total yield was 

 however obtained on the farmyard manure plot, viz., 1,526 

 baskets of fruit, although in three years out of the five one or 

 other of the artificially manured plots exceeded the farmyard 

 manure plot in yield. 



In conclusion, a careful consideration of the different points 

 1 have endeavoured thus briefly to place before you, cannot fail 

 to impress the fact that to manure horticultural soils and crops 

 efficiently, means to-day something more than to incorporate 

 into the earth an exceptionally liberal amount of such a varying 

 substance :is farmyard or stable manure, vegetable composts, and 

 the like, which may take many years to yield all the effects of 

 w hich they may be capable. Further, an excessive accumulation 

 of organie matter in the soil is apt to turn it into a breeding 

 I »lar» for injurious insects, or of parasitic productions. A mode- 

 rate use of what are termed " natural manures," supplemented 



