88 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
[March, 
Beeves.— The market opened weak in spite of light 
receipts, but without any decline in prices ; an export of 
2000 head the first week helping it greatly. In fact, this 
trade is ail that sustains the values of live stock in the 
United States, for a shipment of 5,770 head in one week 
—a quantity unprecedented, and showing to what enor¬ 
mous proportions the business has grown—is clearly the 
mainstay of the trade. This outlet, like a pendulum of a 
clock, checks irregular movements, and the past month 
lias kept a very steady market. Towards the close, prices 
gave way a little and sales were free at a small decline. 
Dressed beef was offered in plenty at 7}c. per lb.; the 
range for poor stock 55 to 56 lbs. per 100, was 7} @ 8£c. 
per lb. for fair to prime, 8Jc. 10c. for 56 lbs. per 100, 
and extra to dress, 57 lbs. per 100 weight, lljc. per lb. 
_Cows.— There has been a quiet sort of demand for 
good milkers, having been taken at prices somewhat 
lower for everthing but choice family cows. The market 
closed steady at $30 to $50 for fair to good, and $60 to $65 
for choice_ Calves. —Business in veal has been brisk, 
except for grassers, which have been neglected under a 
good supply of veals, and brought 2f to 3} cents per lb. 
alive. Veals have sold for 6c. to 8|c. per lb. dressed 
weight_ Sheep and Lambs.- Prices have been 
well sustained and an active demand has existed during 
the past five weeks. Lambs ranged from 6}c. @ 7£c. per 
lb. live weight, and sheep from 5c. to 6ic. per lb. ; some 
choice wethers have sold at $6.60 per 100 lbs. The clos¬ 
ing prices were without change on a firm market.... 
Swine.—A quiet market and steady prices have marked 
the past five weeks. The business has been done mainly 
at 5c. 5Jc. per lb., and at the close, prices were 
slightly lower, the bulk of the sales being at 5c., and a 
few at 5J-C. per lb. 
The Morse Market.— Stock has been accumulat¬ 
ing for months past with nothing to move it but inquiry. 
A few good driving animals have changed hands, but for 
■work and common horses trade has been entirely nomi¬ 
nal. The outlook seems to foreshadow a late and slow 
trade for spring with unsatisfactory prices for dealers. 
Prices of Feed. 
Cotton-seed meal.per ton. $30.00 
Linseed-cake meal. 11 37.50 
Middlings. “ 24.00 
Bran. “ 23.00 
Corn-meal. “ 23.00 
Prices of Fertilizers. 
TTitrate of Potash (95 per cent.), per lb..’. 0 @9><c. 
Sulphate of Potash (potash 44 per cent) per lb.... 3'4@i c. 
do. do. (potash 27>4 per cent) per lb.. 14®l%c. 
German Potash Salts (potash 12 to 15p.c.) p. ton.$15.00@18.00 
Muriate of Potash (potash 50 per cent), per lb_ 2 @2‘Ac. 
Nitrate of Soda, per lb.. 4?f@5 c. 
Sulphate of Ammonia (25 per cent.), per lb. 4c.® IVfc. 
Dried Blood (ammonia 13 percent) per ton.$40.00@45.00 
No.l.Peruv. Guano 10 p.ct. ammonia, standard, ¥ ton..$50.50 
do. do. Lobos, do. do. do. 47.50 
do. do. guaranteed,?! ton, cargo IC 56.00 
do. do. rectified, per ton, 9.00 p. c.. 65.00 
do. do. do. do. 3.40 p. c. 51.00 
Soluble Pacific Guano, ?! ton. . 45.00 
Hxcelsior Fertilizer Works, Fine Ground Raw Bone,.. .55.00 
Mapes’ Complete Manure (clay soils) per 1.000 lbs.25.00 
do. do. do. (light soils) per 1,000 lbs.25.00 
do. do. do. “A” Brand, (wheat) ^ 1,000 lbs. 10.00 
do. Bone, strictly pure, meal ...per ton.42.00 
do. do. do. medium. do. 36.00 
do. do. do. dissolved. do. 42.00 
do. Fruit and Vine Manure. do. 35.00 
Stockbridge Rye Manure, per ton 45.00 
“ Wheat do do 45.00 
“ Seeding Down Manure, per ton. 40.00 
Bowker’s "Wheat Phosphate, per ton. 40.00 
Baugh’s Raw Bone Phosphate, per ton... 33.00 
Baugh's Manure for Tobacco and Grain, per ton.. 45.00 
Walton, Whaun & Co.’s Raw Bone Phosphate_ 40.00 
Gypsum, Nova Scotia, ground, per ton. 7.50 
Pages Worth Studying.— As always, upon the 
approach of spring work, there is an increased number 
of announcements from dealers in Seeds, Plants, Imple¬ 
ments, Fertilizers, etc., and in this year of renewed ac¬ 
tivity in all departments,the crowd is greater than ever. To 
avoid the least trenching upon our reading columns, four 
extra pages have been added to accommodate our friends, 
and still a large number of late comers are necessarily 
left out. These advertising pages are of great value to 
our readers as a source of information, and worth study¬ 
ing carefully to learn what is offered, old and new, and by 
whom. It is equivalent to going to a great Fair, where a 
multitude of reliable men exhibit what they have to sup¬ 
ply. Reading what others say in a business way, and how 
they say it, will usually, give one new thoughts and sug¬ 
gestions useful in his own calling. We have excluded 
many advertisements because not approved, or because 
from men not known to be, or not believed to be, every 
way trustworthy_SSP^When corresponding with any 
of our advertisers, or sending for catalogues, etc., it is 
well to state that yon are a reader of this Journal. They 
will know what we expect, and what you expect of them 
as to prompt and fair treatment. 
Toads are the friends of gardeners, destroying the 
injurious insects in large numbers. In the extensive 
vegetable gardens around London and Paris, the toads 
are looked after with great care, and are even a part of 
the stock invested in the business. Many of the toads 
in and around London are brought from France, where 
they pay as high as six shillings a dozen for them. 
MARCH 01. 
“Forward !.. .MARCH ! ” is the general order for 
this month. Not only is it implied in the name 
of the month itself, but in the Season also. The 
hibernation, the resting of the winter, is coming to 
an end. Work in the Fields and. in the Gardens will 
soon begin, where it is not already under way. 
Much of the success depends upon planning well. 
Is there a man who cultivates a farm, an orchard, 
a vegetable or fruit garden, or a flower plot, or who 
raises animals, that can not find useful hints and 
suggestions in the pages of this Journal ? If there 
is, it is not the paper we intend it to be. 
But we believe it will surely pay every one to study 
these pages. 
Hundreds of thousands are already doing so. 
What of the hundreds of thousands who do not ? 
We fully believe they ought to- do so, for their 
own good, and if we could see them we would tell 
them so, and explain why. 
As we cannot, we ask our readers to do this as a 
double favor to them and to us. 
Last Autumn we prepared the largest and best 
assortment of Premiums ever offered—valuable ar¬ 
ticles to be presented to those who take the trouble 
to invite new readers, and receive and forward the 
names of both old and new subscribers for 1880. 
All those Premiums are still offered to 
our friends, new and old, and will toe 
offered during March, and until June. 
March is a good month to carry on and fill out 
Premium Lists already in progress, and to start 
new clubs. Many thousands of such names are 
sent in every March. 
We invite all our friends to take hold with fresh 
energy, and secure some valuable articles from our 
list. (If any one has not the full Premium List at 
hand, send at once a postal card request, and it 
will be forwarded free.) 
ST WILL PAY A E3SINUS35ESS FOLD, 
to have in every neighborhood, at least a few good books 
on Animals and their Diseases, on General Farming, on 
Gardening, on Fruits, on Farm Implements, etc.,'and at 
least a few Standard Works on other subjects. These 
books ought to be accessible to all for reference in case 
of need, as well as for reading by all—a sort of circulat¬ 
ing or reference library to be in charge of some one. 
Never, before was there so good an opportunity as now 
to get a collection of such Books at very small cost. Any 
ten or more persons contributing $1.50 each, will each be 
supplied with the American Agriculturist for 1S80, and 
in addition, one Hollar’s worth of Books 
will be presented for each Contributor to the fund. The 
books may be selected from the list of 8 4 7 Good Works 
named in our premium sheet. Where the subscriptions 
arc already sent in for 1880, subscriptions for 18S1 may be 
added, when desired, to increase the Library as far as 
possible. Many new subscribers can also be found. 
Every neighborhood may thus secure such a Library. 
It only needs some enterprising man, young or old, to 
take hold of the matter as a leader, and he will soon 
have plenty of helping hands, and heads, and hearts. If 
the Men neglect it, their “ Better-halves,” or Daughters, 
always foremost in good works, should take it up. 
N. E5.— Special.—An Answer to many In¬ 
quirers %—While ten subscribers for one year are pre¬ 
ferred to one subscription for ten years, yet, when special - 
ly desired , any subscriber can pay for as many years in 
advance as he may desire , and count each year as one sub¬ 
scription in making up the Library Club above described. 
Thus: $15 will pay for Ten Years' Subscriptions and 
Ten Dollars Worth of Books for this spring only. 
containing a great variety of Items , including many 
good Hints and Suggestions which we throw into smaller 
type and condensed foim, for want of room elsewhere. 
What to Plant in the Garden, is always a 
puzzling question, and especially so since the very late 
increase in varieties. There is a great choice both as to 
quality and amount of product. Even in a very small gar¬ 
den, a right selection of seeds will make a difference of 
many dollars of real value in what is grown for one’s own 
use—the labor, expense and care being the same. There 
is a multitude of new things worth many times as much 
as the old “ standard ” sorts, both as to quality and yield. 
But among the hundreds of varieties of new peas, beans, 
cabbages, lettuce, corn, potatoes, sweet corn, tomatoes, 
etc., etc., each strongly praised by some seller of seeds, the 
layman is sorely at loss to know what to select, and quite 
likely to get many poor things. To all such, the results 
of 800 trials given by so careful an experimenter as Peter 
Henderson, will be of great value. See page 86. 
Nitrate of Soda, or Chili Saltpetre, is one of the 
leading mineral fertilizers supplied from the immense 
deposites in the rainless desert of Southern Peru. At¬ 
tention was first called to it by Alexander von Humboldt, 
in the early part of this century, but it is not over fifty 
years ago that it was first shipped abroad to any extent. 
The Nitrate of Soda industry is to-day a large and rapidly 
growing one, there being over 250,000 tons of this fertil¬ 
izer mined and exported per year, though it is not all 
used upon the land, a large share going to the manufac¬ 
turers of chemicals as a source of Nitric Acid. It is a 
formidable competitor of the celebrated Peruvian Guano. 
8298,760,867 for Widows and Orphans. 
—In studying the Statement of the Mutual Life Insurance 
Company, as given on page 117, we were forcibly im¬ 
pressed with one item, the “ Policies in force January 1, 
1880,” amounting to nearly three hundred millions of 
dollars, insuring this sum to the survivors at death 
of the holders of 95,423 policies of insurance. As will 
be seen, over seven million dollars were paid to the 
survivors or representatives of insurers during 1879, hut 
the receipts were over seventeen millions despite the 
reduced rates of insurance, and so there is a surplus 
of over Eleven Millions beyond the amount needed to 
render safe and secure the policies in this Company. 
The American Agriculturist Fertilizer 
Experiments. 
The Farmer’s Own Experiments. 
The enterprise first proposed and carried out by the 
American Agriculturist , has given results of great value. 
This plan included showing the farmer how to experi¬ 
ment with fertilizers, and furnishing him at cost, or less, 
with fertilizers of standard quality for the experiments. 
Some of the reports of last year’s experiments, are given 
elsewhere by Prof. Atwater. Can any farmer who uses 
fertilizers at all examine these reports, and not see how 
valuable the knowledge thus gained must be to the exper¬ 
imenter? Would he not gladly have such a knowledge 
of the requirements of his own soil, as these farmers have 
of theirs ? 
Can there be any stronger evidence as to the folly—the 
wastefulness, of the promiscuous hit-or-miss use of ferti¬ 
lizers? It is just as important to know what the soil 
does not need, as it is to know what it does require, and 
what may be applied to it with profit. This knowledge 
can only he obtained from the soil, and through the 
medium of experiments. So well satisfied are we of the 
utility of the experiments already made, that we propose 
to continue them the present year. We commend Prof. 
Atwater’s account of last year’s experiments to the at¬ 
tention of every farmer. If the reader would have a sim¬ 
ilar knowledge of his own soil, we can provide him with 
the means of acquiring it at a very small outlay. The 
full explanation of the plan will be given next month ; 
it will not, however, be essentially different from that 
followed last year, and which was described on pages 
128-129 in April 1879. 
The Experiments for 1880- 
As some of the details for this year have not been 
decided upon, a full explanation will not be given until 
next month. It is not probable that there will be any 
essential variation from the methods as given in April 
1879, and those of our readers at the South, where the 
season for work is already quite advanced, who wish to 
consider the matter earlier, may take last year’s work as 
a general guide. The prices of the parcels may, or may 
not he, slightly advanced, owing to the general higher 
cost of most materials. 
