Felruary 1, 1894. 
JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 
83 
FERTILIZERS FOR SMALL 
FRUITS. 
T he extent of acreage under small fruits has been quadrupled 
during the past ten years. This is in a great measure due to the 
essential manorial elements being obtainable at a low price in the 
shape of commercial fertilizers. There is no question at all as to 
the great advantages to the fruit grower of having efficient 
fertilizers placed within his reach. Formerly his plantations were 
limited by the supply of manure, and his only hope of enlargement 
was by increasing the output. Some persons, however, enlarged 
their plantations, and had no regard to the maintenance of the 
soil’s fertility. Those soon found out that their ventures were 
^unprofitable, and the panacea offered the farmer to help him out of 
the slough of depression and set him on a firm footing mere delusion. 
Where was the manure to come from if every acre of small fruit 
plantation required 20 to 40 tons of farmyard manure annually, or 
if artificial fertilizers were used every third year ? His only hope 
of engaging in small fruit culture was by increasing the number of 
his stock, thus compelling him to unite his two lines of industry. 
This in many cases was practically impossible, for with land 
already requiring more manure than could be manufactured on the 
spot to maintain it in condition, and render the cultivation of crops 
profitable, what was the good of engaging in a pursuit calculated to 
impoverish the farm ? 
But some persons saw a way to unite both lines of industry 
without derogation to the condition of the land under whichever 
crop it might be. These took advantage of the fact that the 
elements contained in farmyard, stable, or town manure could be 
obtained at a low price in the shape of commercial fertilizers, and 
their engaging in fruit growing were only limited by the amount 
of the land and by the capital at their disposal, for they could 
easily procure every needed element of fertility. The outcome 
has been eminently satisfactory in most cases, some cultivating 
as many acres of small fruits as they formerly had under cereal 
crops, while not a few persons have fruit farms quite as large as 
their purely agricultural land extended previously. This has been 
rendered practicable only by the liberal use of commercial fer¬ 
tilizers. It must, however, be distinctly understood that not one 
of these successful cultivators places a low estimate on stable, 
farmyard, or town manure, nor would they have anyone dispense 
with solid manure altogether. But the concensus of evidence 
from them is to use only enough stable, farmyard, or town manure 
to insure the vegetable tilth or humus, and supplement it with 
concentrated fertilizers. They advocate this course on the score 
of economy, being firmly convinced of the waste in buying 
and carting manure several miles to get only 25 lbs. of actual 
plant food to the ton. That is all the plant food there 
is in 2240 lbs. (1 ton) of manure, the remaining 2215 lbs. 
being silicates and organic matter of no special benefit to the crop 
in the year of application beyond that of humus. The cost of 
20 tons of farmyard manure is much more than that of 2240 lbs. 
of fertilizers, and the latter are conveyed to the land, and 
crops at a twentieth of the cost for carriage. Such experience is 
doubly interesting, from the fact that most farmers, and gardeners 
for that matter, were sceptics formerly on the use of commercial 
fertilizers, they having previously held that there was nothing 
equal to stable or farmyard manure. 
The three principal elements in farmyard manure are phos- 
No. 710. —VoL. XXVIII., Third Series, 
phoric acid, potash, and nitrogen. These can he separately 
purchased, the first in bone superphosphate, and is sold at about 
£5 lOs. per ton, with a guarantee of 2^ to 3 per cent, of ammonia 
and 30 to 35 per cent, of phosphate ; the second in kainit, which 
costs about £2 to £2 10s. per ton, with a guarantee of 24 to 26 per 
cent, of potash ; and the third in sulphate of ammonia, or in 
nitrate of soda, the latter of which is now to be had at about £8 
per ton, with a guarantee of not less than 95 per cent, of pure 
nitrate, and contains about 16 per cent, of nitrogen. A ton of 
farmyard manure rarely contains more than 10 to 12 lbs. of this 
valuable substance—nitrogen, and it is the most costly ingredient 
of artificial fertilizers. Farmyard manure is about three-fourths 
water, and contains about 500 lbs, of organic matter, with from 
55 to 65 lbs. of ash. The nitrogen of farmyard manure has to 
undergo a gradual change into nitric acid and nitrates before it can 
be taken up by plants. This applies to all the nitrogen contained 
in the decaying organic matter in soils or in manures. Nitrogen is 
of no use whatever in the soil until it is converted into nitric acid 
or nitrates, and how much of this in the shape of ammonia is 
evaporated, or that carried oflE by rains as nitrates, nobody knows. 
M. Ville says the loss is immense in farmjard manure during its 
conversion into food for plants. Therefore it may be said that 
the only element of direct value as plant food in farmyard manure, 
is for the most part lost to the crops. 
Chemists, however, are apt to overlook the importance of the" 
warmth imparted to the soil and the moisture evolved for the 
benefit of the plants during the conversion of the organic matter- 
into ammonia, and the heat that must accompany the nitric ferment 
cannot but benefit the plants. This, in my experience, gives an. 
immense advantage over artificial fertilizers, and is one of the 
reasons why it is undesirable to entirely dispense with stable, farm¬ 
yard, or town manure, or such substances as waste from furriers,, 
rags, and shoddy. A grower, however, insists that farmyard manure 
may be altogether dispensed with for small fruits, as it certainly is 
in orchard culture. This is not a new doctrine, and is had advan¬ 
tage of by most growers without knowing it. He says, “ It is all 
very well to describe gardens and fruit plantations without weeds. 
They are difficult to keep down in mine. They will get rank before 
autumn—that is, the annual weeds, and it is a capital thing too, 
for by turning them under, the land is furnished with the same 
kind of organic matter that I should otherwise have to buy, and is 
contained in stable manure.” This was a puzzle. No manure—all 
the organic matter the small fruit plantation needed in the fifteen 
years of its existence for supplying humus was supplied by the 
weeds that could not be kept down by hoeing. There was not a 
perennial weed of any kind in this plantation, yet the annual 
ones got ahead, particularly in wet seasons, and were turnecfe 
under once a year with the result that no solid manure was. 
required. 
What small fruits require and get from the soil are nitrogen,., 
phosphoric acid, and potash. It is necessary to have a goodly store 
of the two last in the soil, or the nitrate of soda or sulphate of 
ammonia will do little good, for the power of nitrogen is in propor¬ 
tion to the amounts of phosphoric acid and potash available a-s 
food when it is applied in a form fitted for taking up by the roots, 
and at once combining with those substances to push ahead and 
build up the structures of the plant—the growth, leaves, and fruit. 
In fact, there is nothing like nitrogen for berries—making fruit, 
swell, to fill the baskets sooner. 
I suppose everybody knows that small fruit bushes produce an 
amazing number of tiny fibres early in the spring. Persons digging 
late—after the buds commence swelling—must have seen the small 
roots permeating the soil in all directions, and have noted how- 
clean and healthy they look as compared with the old roots. Of 
course they take the hint, and point the ground over sooner 
another year, for who can but see in these hair-like roots the 
foragers for the coming crop ? They learn something more—thal; 
No. 23G6.—VoL. XC., Old Series. 
