127 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
As to the retentive power of gypsum to ammo¬ 
nia in the presence of abundant moisture, as 
for example, when mingled, with putrefying urine, 
or thrown upon night soil in a vault, there has 
never been a doubt. It may be remarked here 
that it is not, strictly speaking, the gypsum that 
fixes the ammonia, but the sulphuric acid which 
the gypsum contains. This acid unites with the 
ammonia, forming sulphate of ammonia, thus fix¬ 
ing and retaining the floating material by destroy¬ 
ing its volability, and giving it the form of a per¬ 
manent salt. The remaining elements of the sul¬ 
phate of lime and carbonate of ammonia, unite at 
the same time and form carbonate of lime. The 
whole action is simply an “exchangs of partners,” 
or what is called in chemical language, a double 
decomposition. 
But it is a singular fact that the partners change 
baek again just as soon as they get dry. The new 
alliances do not stand the pressure of hard times. 
As soon as moisture is gone, the ammonia leaves 
its new partner, and yoking itself again to the old 
one goes on its way as it started, in the form of 
carbonate of ammonia. The production of smell¬ 
ing salts by mixing sulphate (or muriate) of am¬ 
monia and chalk, is a consequence of such a 
changing back to carbonate'of ammonia (the vola¬ 
tile constituent of the smelling salts) and sulphate 
(or muriate) of lime, which remains permanently 
in the phial. 
It may also be shown by a very simple experi¬ 
ment that dry gypsum will not retain carbonate 
of ammonia If the powdered materials are 
mixed and moistened, and afterwards exposed for 
a few days to the air, it will be found that the car¬ 
bonate has left the gypsum entirely, and escaped 
into the air. 
It would seem, then, at first sight, to be estab¬ 
lished that a covering of gypsum on a dry manure 
heap will not insure the rention of the ammonia. 
What seems dry, however, may not be, in reality, 
perfectly dry. It certainly is not, if fermentation 
is going on beneath it. For, in the first place, 
somewhat abundant moisture is essential to the 
process, and this moisture must escape with the 
products of fermentation. And again, the very 
process itself which produces ammonia out of the 
elements of the fermenting substance, produces 
water also out of the elements of the same mate¬ 
rial. For these two reasons, therefore, we may 
always be sure of a certain portion of moisture 
where fermentation is going on. The practical 
question is, whether the moisture is in sufficient 
quantity. My experiments seems to answer this 
question in the affirmative. 
EXPERIMENTS. 
The experiments were made by covering fer¬ 
menting stable manure with a layer of the same 
material (stable manure) perfectly dried over a 
fire, and then upon this a thin coating of ground 
gypsum or plaster. 
The fermentation was carried on in a covered 
pail, so arranged that all the gases and vapors ri¬ 
sing from it could be drawn off and tested. Before 
covering with the plaster, there was an abundant 
flow of ammonia through the layer of dry manure, 
but the layer of plaster being added, no particle 
of ammonia escaped. 
The usual condition of a manure heap, even in 
hot weather, would be much more favorable to 
the retention of ammonia than in the experiment 
described. The heap would rarely ifeverbedry 
to the depth of an inch. Even if this were the 
case it would seem evident from the above ex¬ 
periment that sufficient moisture would escape 
with the ammonia to insure its fixation by the 
plaster. But it is to be borne in mind that where 
the surface is comparatively dry, more plaster 
must be used. The covering must be quite per¬ 
fect, as in this case the plaster has little opportu¬ 
nity of diffusing itself by solution, as it does, to a 
considerable extent, in a moist heap. 
John A. Porter. 
New Haven, April 29, 1857. 
CONCENTRATED FERTILIZERS AND 
BARN-Y1RD MANURES. 
EXPERIMENTS WITH THEM. 
The position taken by this journal in re¬ 
gard to concentrated manures is, that they 
only hold a secondary place, and that a 
farmer with good facilities for making ma¬ 
nures upon his own premises has little occa¬ 
sion to resort to them. Bone-dust and guano 
may sometimes be used to good advantage 
on particular crops, but the main reliance of 
the cultivator must be upon the muck 
swamps and the excretia of his own stock. 
We have come to this conclusion after some 
years of careful experimenting and close 
observation of the practice of good culti¬ 
vators. 
A clerical friend, who has a penchant for 
farming, gives us the following records from 
his field-book of last year. The experiment 
was designed to test the comparative value 
of barn-yard manure with purchased fertil¬ 
izers. His soil is a sandy loam, and lacks 
vegetable matter, though it is alluvial in its 
formation. He planted com in half acre 
strips, making six plots for as many kinds of 
manure or mixed fertilizers. The whole 
ground was manured with ashes and plas¬ 
ter, at the rate of six bushels of the mixture 
to the acre. This was put on at the first 
two hoeings : 
No. 1 was manured with 14 one-horse 
cart loads of stable manure. The result w'as 
54 bushels of ears of good corn, and 16 of 
soft. 
No. 2 had 225 pounds superphosphate of 
lime (bought in New-York city), with ashes 
and plaster. The result was only 9 bushels of 
good corn, and 9 of poor. 
No. 3 was manured with 112 pounds^pf 
guano, 112 of superphosphate mixed mth 
muck, so as to make the bulk of the whole 
■134 bushels, besides the ashes and plaster. 
The crop was 22 bushels of good ears, and 
30 of poor. 
No. 4 had 112 pounds of guano, and 6 
bushels of salt, with the dressing of ashes 
and plaster. The result was 27 bushels of 
good corn, and 8 of poor. 
No. ’^had guano, salt, superphosphate 
and plaster mixed in equal proportion, so as 
to make the cost equal to either of the 
above. The result was 33 bushels of good 
ears, and 10 of poor. 
No. 6 had 225 pounds of guano, and 1 
bushel of plaster. The result was 38 bush¬ 
els of good ears, and 10 of poor. 
He designed to have the manure upon 
each plot equal the value of the 14 loads of 
stable manure, which he tRinks cost him not 
over fifty cents a load. It Will be seen from 
these results, that seven dollars worth of 
stable manure secured much more corn than 
the same amount of money investld-in other 
fertilizers, and that the guano aM plaster 
were next in their productiveness^ The re¬ 
turns from the superphosphate are so mea¬ 
ger, that there is good foundation for the 
opinion of our friend, that “ it was not worth 
a button.” The natural yield of the soil with 
the dressing of ashes and plaster could 
hardly have been less. There is little doubt 
that thousands of tons of a bogus article are 
every year sold for superphosphate. 
.The returns from the whole three acres 
are 302 bushels of ears, of which it will be 
seen 70 grew upon the half acre fertilized 
from the stable. The average upon the re¬ 
maining five plots is 46 bushels. Had he 
spent his seven dollars in muck and labor, 
making compost from the stable manures, 
he would have had 24 bushels more of ears 
upon each of the remaining plots, making 
1-20 bushels, or 60 of shelled corn. As corn 
is worth about a dollar a bushel, the experi¬ 
ment has cost him about sixty dollars, to 
say nothing of his own time and trouble in 
preparing the manures, measuring the plots 
of ground, and the crops. One can see in 
these facts, that it costs something to make 
agricultural experiments, and the need of an 
experimental farm supported by the State, 
where such results can be wrought out for 
the public good, at the public expense. 
Owing to early planting, he had all his 
corn-field to plant over. As the result of 
his experiments, his conclusions arc : 
1. To make his own manures and eschew 
concentrated fertilizers. 
2. M)t to try to plant too early. The very 
last week.of May is early enough. 
3. To cut. up corn by the ground, and not 
top it. 
4. To raise less poor corn, if possible. It 
was mere moonshine in feeding out. 
5. To keep account of the expense of 
raising the various cropS upon the farm. 
These are sound conclusions, and will 
commend thenjselves to the good sense of 
our readers. 
NUMBER OF POUNDilN A BUSHEL 
IN THE DIFFERED STATES. 
The following is in a more convenient form 
than the table we have previously published. 
ARTICLES. 
| New-York 
]Ohio.| 
[Pennsylvania. 
jlndiana. 
5 
o 
3 
|lowa. 
Illinois.! 
|. 
C 
s 
n 
o 
X 
X 
o 
C 
1 Rhode Island. | 
| Kentucky ... 
fl> 
f 
a> 
<t> 
■< 
l ^ 
CO 
[Canada .... 
Wheat, lb. 
.60 
60 
6l 
60 
00 
60 
60 
ib 
60 
60 
60 
60 
60 
50 
Rye. J 
56 
56 
56 
56 
56 
54 
56 
56 
50 
56 
56 
56 
56156 
Corn. 4M 
66 
56 
56 
56 
5b 
56 
56 
56 
?6 
56 
56 
56 
52 
56 
Oats. 
32 
32 
32 
32 
35 
32 
32 
28 
30 
30 
32 
m 
34 
Bariev. 
48 
48 
47 
48 
48 
48 
44 
48 
46 
4S 
48 
46 
in 
4S 
Buckwheat.. 
48 
48 
50 
42 
52 
40 
42 
45 
46 
52 
50 
46 
m 
48 
60 
64 
60 
60 
60 
60 
60 
9)4 
60 
Timothy seed 
44 
42 
45 
45 
rn 
m 
45 
»; 
in 
48 
Flaxseed .... 
55 
56 
56 
56 
m 
m 
56 
55 
m 
56 
Hempseed... 
44 
44 
44 
14 
A 
14 
i4 
22 
25 
30 
28 
24 
28 
22 
32 
33 
28 
33 
28 
22 
24 
Coarse Salt.. 
50 
50 
85 
50 
50 
70 
50 
, 
&0 
56 
Fine Salt.... 
56 
50 
62 
50 
50 
70 
50 
50 
56 
Potatoes. 
60 
60 
60 
60 
60 
60 
60 
i 
60 
f 
0!) 
m 
Beans . 
62 
56 
. 
oa 
f. 
60 
60 
:: l 
60 
46 
46 
- 
5? 
:: 
50 
50 
.. 
:: 
50 
50 
.. 
.. 
1 
70 
i 
We have not in all cases b^SnAable to correct these 
figures by comparing them with auWirized copies of the 
laws, but we believe they are nearly i»ot quite accurate. 
Should any error be discovered weevil! republish the 
table with corrections. The letter m signifies sold by 
measure. 
