250 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
[July, 
then supplied in the cheapest and best manner. 
The wants of different soils can be learned only by 
experience and experiment. In brief, every farmer 
must study his own soil if he will get the best re¬ 
sults from its cultivation. He must know, among 
other things, what plant-food his crops need, and 
approximately at least what and how much his soils 
supply. He must learn by what methods of tillage, 
culture, and manuring the natural supplies may 
best be utilized, and the deficiencies supplied. He 
must understand what different manures contain, 
that bone, and Peruvian guano, and fish, and most 
of our phosphates furnish nitrogen and phosphoric 
acid and lime ; that the superphosphates contain 
sulphuric acid also; that the potash salts fur¬ 
nish potash, soda, magnesia, sulphuric acid, and 
60 on, but that they all contain these ingredients 
in varying proportions and in forms such as to ex¬ 
ert widely different effects on the soil. He must 
consider that these are all special manures, good 
where they are, and useless where they are not 
needed. Stable manure is a complete fertilizer and 
safe and useful everywhere. What artificial ma¬ 
nures can be most profitably used to supplement 
this is best learned by observation and experiment. 
I know a good many readers will say, “Tour 
doctrine is all very good, but how are we going to 
study our soils and crops and manures ? We have 
neither the time nor the means to make all these 
elaborate experiments, nor have we the scientific 
knowledge needed to make them successful. Wc 
cannot even tell whether a fertilizer we buy is gen¬ 
uine or not.”—Well, that is all true. But observe 
where you can, buy books and papers and read them 
and use your influence to encourage others to study 
and experiment, and explain for you. Will it not 
pay better to do this than to give fifty dollars a ton 
for phosphates without knowing whether they are 
genuine, and run the risk of their not being what 
you want even if they are genuine ? 
Fiirm Experiments 
with different fertilizers to test the needs of differ¬ 
ent soils, need not be so elaborate as the ones 
described above. Circular No. 4, of our Experi¬ 
ment Station, which treats of the Commercial Fer¬ 
tilizers sold in Connecticut, contains the following 
paragraph : 
“ For farmers who have not their own experience, or 
that of others in like circumstances, to guide them, the 
most sensible plan is to try experiments on a small scale, 
with different trustworthy fertilizers of high grade. The 
ones that prove most satisfactory, can then bo used with 
confidence, in large quantities. Should the plan meet 
with sufficient encouragement, the Station will arrange 
With some of the manufacturers whose wares are sold 
under its supervision, to have small lots of high grade 
fertilizers of different kinds, put up in lots of fifty 
pounds or more each, and sold at low prices for experi¬ 
ments. Each lot of ‘experimental fertilizers’ will be 
accompanied with descriptions and directions for exper¬ 
iment, so that the user may, by proper care, with com¬ 
paratively little expense, test the special wants of his 
own fields and crops.” 
Some experiments of this sort are already in op¬ 
eration. Dried blood, sulphate of ammonia, and 
nitrate of soda, are used to furnish nitrogen. A 
high-grade superphosphate for phosphoric acid; 
and high-grade German potash salts for potash. 
These are used both separately and mixed together, 
parallel experiments being made with them and 
with lime, plaster, and barn-yard dung. These ex¬ 
periments cost but little, but, if carried out with 
any fair degree of care, must prove very instructive. 
Connecticut Agricultural Experiment Station, Wesleyan 
University, Middletown , Conn. 
Value of Small Roots. —Much injury has 
doubtless been done by the absurd offer of premi¬ 
ums at agricultural fairs for the largest sized pump¬ 
kins, potatoes, cabbages, and roots. Size is no test 
of excellence; on the contrary, fair sized, well 
grown, healthy vegetables and fruits are of better 
quality than the over-grown, monstrous ones, 
Which have been fed and forced with liquid ma¬ 
nure. For feeding animals, moderately sized roots 
are much more Valuable than large ones, and a 
mangel or beet of 6 or 8 pounds is more nutritious 
in proportion to its size, than one of 20 pounds. 
In cultivating roots, the aim should be to encour¬ 
age a thick growth of small roots, rather than a 
sparse growth of large ones. The crop in the ag¬ 
gregate may not be so heavy, but it will be worth 
more for feeding. The beet-sugar manufacturers 
instruct the farmers, who grow beets for them, to 
produce roots as near 2 pounds in weight, as pos¬ 
sible, as these contain one-third or one-half more 
sugar than the large ones. 
- ■ » — - 
Ogden Farm Papers—No. 77. 
BY GEORGE E. WARING, JR. 
The opinion has generally prevailed that the on¬ 
ly marked economic value of the Jersey cow lay in 
her extra quantity and quality of butter product. 
She now appears on the stage in quite a new light 
—as a cheese maker. At Wintlirop, Maine, a cheese 
factory, established two years ago, has been sup¬ 
plied from a region where a good strain of Jersey 
blood was introduced many years ago by Dr. 
Holmes, editor of the Maine Farmer, and where it 
has been appreciated and extended, until it is 
estimated that the cows supplying this factory 
average at least one-half Jersey blood. The cheese 
made is extremely rich in fat. Dr. Vcelcker gives 
analyses of various English cheeses, showing an 
average percentage of fat as follows : 
Stilton.40.67 | Double Gloucester_27.30 
Yorkshire Stilton.30.00 | Single Gloucester.28.64 
Cheshire.30.92 j Wiltshire.24.50 
Cheddar.31.06 [ American.31.43 
Cheese made at the Winthrop factory, and ana¬ 
lysed at Cornell University, contained 39.24 of fat. 
In 1875, near the end of September, cheese was 
made from the milk of thoroughbred Jerseys alone. 
One of these cheeses was sent to Prof. Arnold, who 
reports : “ I have made one determination of the 
fat it contains, and found 40.2 per cent pure fat. 
Did not think I got it all. It is a very choice ar¬ 
ticle. Since writing the above I have plugged the 
cheese again. It is certainly very fine. 1 meet with 
nothing better from any quarter whatever. It is as 
rich as Stilton, salvey and soluble, melting in the 
mouth, and has a fine, nutty flavor, with plenty of 
body.” 
The Jerseys are making their way with great 
rapidity, considering hard times, on the merit of 
their butter producing quality alone, and if they 
are to add to this advantage that of being the pro¬ 
ducers of a cheese, which will rival the richest of 
the epicure cheeses, those interested in breeding 
them are to be still farther congratulated. 
During the past winter we have been using corn- 
meal for the first time as our principal reliance as 
an addition to hay. The hay was almost entirely of 
home production, and of much better quality (aver¬ 
age) than we used several years ago. Only an aver¬ 
age of two quarts of corn-meal per day was fed to 
each cow. Its effect on their condition seemed fa¬ 
vorable, and on their product of butter decidedly 
good. The calves produced were strong, and up 
to this time the experiment seemed quite success¬ 
ful, but in a number of cases, where we had hither¬ 
to had some difficulty with the calves, owing to too 
great richness of the dam’s milk, this difficulty has 
been increased, so that we have had more cases of 
“scours” than usual, and some of these have 
proved fatal. It is not safe to draw positive de¬ 
ductions from limited experiments, but we believe 
that in this regard, and this only, corn-meal has 
been a disadvantage to us. If we use this food 
again next winter, we shall withhold it entirely for 
a month before calving-time. 
Referring to a communication concerning thor¬ 
oughbred and grade Jerseys, on page 207 (June), 
I agree with what is there stated, except as to the 
question of constitutional vigor. I have kept, and 
I have known a very large number of thoroughbred 
and grade Jersey cattle, and I am satisfied that under 
ordinary treatment—that is, with some better shel¬ 
ter than the lee-sidc of a hay-stack in severe winter 
weather, and with a sufficiency of food—the thor¬ 
oughbred Jersey is in all respects as hardy and 
healthy, and as easily reared and cared for, as the 
commonest scrub. Having a less luxuriant growth 
of hair, they do not, if starved, or if exposed to the 
bitterest weather, bear their trials so well, as shag¬ 
gy native cattle, but under any treatment that a hu¬ 
mane or judicious farmer would give to cows of 
any breed, the question of constitution may be left 
out of the consideration in adopting them for use. 
The sanitary question is making its way as a 
popular topic with much rapidity. It is interesting 
to know that the inquiries made on the subject, 
come more and more from farmers, and those who 
live in isolated country houses—where the question 
of foul air from public sources is not to be con¬ 
sidered. Inquirers of this class evince a great in¬ 
terest in the earth-closet question. The first con¬ 
sideration is, of course, of convenience and health— 
absence from exposure, and protection against foul 
air and poisoned well water. But the manure ques¬ 
tion is also much thought of. I have always been an 
advocate of the earth system, from the time of its 
first introduction, and see no reason to change my 
opinion concerning its value in the case not only of 
isolated houses, but quite as much for small towns 
and villages. At the same time it seems to be de¬ 
monstrated that the inducements for its introduc¬ 
tion must depend largely on the items of health 
and convenience, and less on the economic value of 
its product, than was at first supposed. 
I have on several occasions in these papers 
questioned the policy of summer fallowing, for the 
reason that the free exposure of the organic mat¬ 
ters contained in the soil to the action of the ail- 
condensed in its pores, (and frequently changed,) 
is subjected to an actual combustion (oxidation), 
and is practically destroyed and removed—by evap¬ 
oration or filtration. Fecal matter, mixed with 
earth to be acted on by atmospheric air is destroyed 
in the same manner. The first effect of the oxidation 
is, of course, to develop its fertilizing activity, but 
there is no reason to suppose that the process stops 
at this point. It undoubtedly continues, until the 
products of decomposition are actually render¬ 
ed so volatile, and so soluble, as to escape into the 
atmosphere, and become lost to the manure. Earth 
that has been used over and over again in this way, 
retains of course all, or nearly all, of the manurial 
ingredients of faecal matter. But the nitrogenous 
parts—those to which faecal matter owes its most 
active effect, when used as manure in its fresh 
state, are to a considerable degree practically lost. 
It has been a favorite theory that, in the economy 
of nature, so valuable an ingredient as nitrogen must 
be retained by the soil it reaches until consumed by 
the crop, but unfortunately nature has her own 
way of managing her economies, and is much given 
to the rapid distribution of the elements of plant- 
food. Mr. J. B. Lawes, of Rothhampstead, finds 
as a result of his unequaled experience, that nitro¬ 
gen is very fleeting in its character, being hard to 
hold after it has reached the condition in which it 
is ready for the uses of vegetation, saying that the 
nitrogen in nitrate of soda “is not only perfectly 
soluble, but is very rapidly washed into the sub¬ 
soil, and beyond the reach of the roots of the plants. 
Boussingault made an analysis of the water of the 
Seine in the heart of Paris, and estimated that on 
that day 47 tons of ammonia, and over 182 tons of 
nitric acid were carried to the sea by that river 
alone.” Everything indicates that nitrogenous 
manures, so far as they are to be considered as a 
stimulant to the growth of plants, must, to pro¬ 
duce their full effect, be skillfully applied, in such 
a manner and at such a time as to strike the crop 
at the right moment, and in the right way, for their 
effect is so transitory, that unless their ammonia 
and nitric acid are used as they are produced, they 
are in constant danger of being wasted. 
It must, therefore, not be supposed that night- 
soil mixed with and decomposed in the dry earth of 
the closet, will contribute to the crop to which it is 
eventually applied, anything like the full effect that 
is due to its original content of nitrogen. This ele¬ 
ment will be very largely wasted—not lost to the 
economy of nature, of course, but sent into the 
atmosphere to return to other fields as much as to 
our own. The phosphates and the alkalies will re- 
