—E———awe eee 
Cea as 
8 BULLETIN 798, U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 
Nearly four-fifths of the ammonia in fertilizers is thus derived from 
the two great mineral sources, sodium nitrate and ammonium sul- 
phate, together with the two principal organic sources, tankage and 
cottonseed meal. 
The only other important source of ammonia reported is ‘‘base 
goods,”’ a designation which indicates that the original source is not 
given, base goods being a name by which the companies call pre- 
liminary mixtures which are stored in large bins against the time 
when orders need to be filled and the base goods are mixed with other 
ingredients to obtain a desired grade of goods. 
Other sources of ammonia worth mentioning are cyanamid, which 
yielded 581,000 units of ammonia in 1917 but only 95,000 units in 
1918, owing to the fact that this material was requisitioned by the 
Ordnance Department; and dried blood, which accounted for 2.8 per 
cent and 2.4 per cent, respectively, during 1917 and 1918. 
Tankage.—A special inquiry about the amount of tankage pro- 
duced was sent out by the office of Fertilizer Control, and returns 
from 503 packers and renderers were received. ‘Table VII shows the 
total quantity of tankage and allied materials produced during 1917 
and 1918, and the quantity marketed in 1918 to be used as fertilizer, 
to be used for feed, and for other purposes. 
TaBLeE VII.—Tankage and allied products produced in 1917 and 1918 and marketed in 
1918. 
Foca ae | Quantity marketed in 1918, 386 firms | Percentage marketed, 
(2,000-p iat i: ore) reporting (2,000-pound tons). 1918. 
Kind of material. se = 
or or 
As fer- other | As fer- other 
1917 1918 Total. | tilizer, |AS feed. pur- | tilizer. As feed. pur- 
poses. poses. 
Animal tankage(high 
fk grade ©) TR i 157,300 | 185,839 | 182,320 | 103,703 | 78,187 430 56.9 42.9 0.2 
nimaltankage (low 
és grade)... See 59, 604 64,614 62,805 56,239 | 5,213 | 1,354 89.5 8.3 2.2 
Pee tank- 
tata say a 24,674 | 25,490 | 26,098 | 16,540] 9,481 77| 63.4] 36.3 8 
aaeeea tankage..... 36, 997 34,718 | 28,598 280985 |=4s- 445. 552s 100) jb Sect es eae ee 
Tankage (n.0.S.)....| 7,750 | 10,004 3, 732 3, 122 58 552 | 83.7 1.6 14.7 
Dred ilood ee pee 32, 007 35, 4€3 32, 578 26,918: 40 5 (671) | he = B aS 14.9 
AWiVDONES<ceneaace- 27,981 33, 644 26, 451 22,607 | 3,281 862 NG) iE ans 
Dried poness e222. 58! 24,348 | 21,475 | 20,158) 20,093] ° 5 f BPs) a eS55) | dS 3 2 
Rireicre he ee ett 5, 617 8, 754 4, 638 TOT jee 658 | Ses eee : 
Hoofs and horns..... 6, 715 4,671 4,008 ” 539 386 | 7 88.3 9.6 rat 
Meat scrap.........-- 3, 265 3, 233 5 as eee et 3,549 1 a gt ae | 99.7 3 
The 503 firms for which returns were received produced 157,000 
tons of high-grade tankage in 1917 and 186,000 tons in 1918. The 
quantity of low-grade tankage was about one-third of the amount 
of high-grade tankage, and in addition there were about 25,000 
tons of concentrated tankage in each of the two years 1917 and 
1918, and about 35,000 tons of garbage tankage, with a certain 
amount of tankage the character and quality of which were not 
