116 
T>‘ho  RURAL  NEW-YORKER 
.Tanuary  1U10. 
HOPE  FARM  NOTES 
Phosphates :  Their  Origin  and  Use 
Part  I. 
Some  months  ago  tlic  Hope  Harm  man 
had  some  articles  on  lime  and  liming, 
which  I  could  understand.  I  would  now 
like  to  have  some  articles  of  the  same 
sort  on  phosphorus.  We  hear  more  about 
it  than  ever  before,  ami  we  are  asked  to 
bay  various  kinds  of  “phosphates.”  Xow 
what  is  phosphorus,  what  was  Us  origin 
and  what  is  the  difference  between  one 
kind  of  phosphate  and  another?  Can  you 
toll  us  so  we  can  understand  it V 
B.  J.  l«. 
I  doubt  if  1  can  make  it  entirely  clear, 
hut  1  will  try  it.  This  is  n  job  for  the 
chemist,  but  sometimes  he  knows  so 
much  about  it  that  he  needs  an  inter¬ 
preter  to  make  himself  understood. 
Wiiat  It  Is. — The  name  comes  from 
Greek  words  meaning  “I  carry”  or  "I  hear 
light.”  The  name  was  first  applied  to 
any  substance  which  was  capable  of  be¬ 
coming  luminous  or  giving  off  light  in  the 
dark  without  apparent  burning.  Most  of 
us  have  seen  articles  coated  with  some 
preparation  of  phosphorus  which  “shine 
bright.”  at  night.  When  I  iirst  went 
South  some  one  made  me  a  present  of  a 
match  safe  made  in  the  shape  of  a  hideous 
human  face.  It  was  coated  with  some 
phosphatie  material,  and  at  night  it  fair¬ 
ly  blazed  out  iu  the  dark.  I  slept  in  a 
little  house  outside  the  main  building 
and  had  this  match  box  on  the  wall.  One 
night  I  was  wakened  by  a  fearful  groan, 
and  there  stood  a  very  black  darkey  with 
chattering  teeth,  mumbling  in  fear.  He 
had  come  in  for  some  petty  stealing  and 
caught  sight  of  that  terrible  face  shining 
out  of  its  black  corner.  Many  of  you 
have  read  Charles  lteade*s  “Cloister  aud 
the  llenrth”  and  remember  how  they 
used  a  paint  containing  phosphorus  to 
paint  “ Death ”  on  the  dead  man’s  face! 
This  shining  quality  seems  to  he  due  to 
a  very  slow  combustion  which  is  charac¬ 
teristic  of  phosphorus. 
Where  Foujsu. — You  might  perhaps 
say  that  the  colored  gentleman  in  my 
room  suffered  from  a  surplus  of  phos¬ 
phorus  or  from  a  lack  of  it.  This  sub¬ 
stance  is  found  in  bone,  the  nerves,  the 
brain  and  in  all  the  vital  parts  of  ani¬ 
mal  or  vegetable  bodies.  If  my  colored 
visitor  had  had  more  phosphorus  iu  his 
brain  lie  would  not  have  been  fueled  by 
the  same  clement  which  was  smeared  on 
the  face,  for  he  would  have  known  better, 
lie  probably  hud  a  very  thick  skull. 
With  phosphorus  in  the  brain  you  have 
wiselioud,  while  in  the  skull  you  have 
bom-head,  but  unless  you  have  phosphor* 
us  in  your  food  you  can  have  neither 
brains  nor  head.  No  wonder  (he  an¬ 
cients  regarded  phosphorus  as  the  life 
principle.  Probably  of  all  the  elements 
it  gets'  down  closest  lo  the  vital  parts  of 
life.  A  human  body  weighing  1(55  pounds 
will  Consist  of  about  155  pounds  of  soft- 
parts  and  a  skeleton  weighing  about  10 
pounds.  The  soft  parts  when  burned 
give  about  1.5  per  cent,  of  ash.  This 
added  to  the  ash  of  the  bones  and  re¬ 
duced  to  actual  phosphorus  shows  that 
the  human  body  contain  less  than  two 
pounds  in  a  total  of  It  15.  To  show  how 
this  important  element  is  distributed  in 
vegetation  we  may  look  over  the  follow¬ 
ing  (able,  which  compares  the  seeds  and 
stalks  and  also  the  amounts  of  potash 
and  phosphoric  acid. 
Pminds 
;  in  100; 
Plios.  Acid. 
Potash, 
Wheat 
grain . 
. 85 
.50 
Wheat 
straw. 
. 15 
.00 
Oat  grain.... 
. 80 
.00 
Oat:  tsti 
•,1Wv  - 
. 20 
1.25 
K.ve  gr 
aiu . . . 
. 85 
.00 
live  st 
ra  w .  .  . 
. 30 
.85 
Wheat 
bran  - . 
.  2.00 
1.00 
Wheat 
flour . . 
. GO 
.5<‘ 
(’lover 
seed .  .  . 
.  1.50 
1.40 
Clover 
hay. 
. 55 
1 .85 
You 
sou  that  the  grains,  which  ; 
ire  the 
vital  pr 
i  nei|  >le 
of  the 
plant,  contain 
i  about 
four  li 
hips  as 
much 
phosphorus 
as  the 
straw. 
Anot  li 
icr  thing — notice  lit 
iw  t  he 
bran  compares  with  the  flour.  That  is 
because  the  phosphates  help  make  up  the 
hard.  tOUgh  shell  of  the  grain.  When  this 
and  the  germ  are  taken  out  as  bran  the 
flour  shows  much  less  phosphorus,  just 
as  the  animal  body  deprived  of  its  hones 
and  skin  will  give  hut  a  small  amount 
of  phosphorus  compared  with  the  entire 
body.  All  this  is  referred  to  so  that  we 
may  see  from  the  beginning  something  of 
the  vital  need  of  phosphorus  in  feeding 
both  animals  and  plants.  Nothing  in 
nature  can  take  its  place.  Deprive  cat¬ 
tle  of  phosphorus  and  lime  and  they  can¬ 
not  make  bone  and  muscle  properly. 
They  may  even  be  fat.  but  they  have  a 
“depraved  appetite,”  and  go  around 
chewing  bones  or  old  hoards  or  drinking 
tilth.  Try  to  grow  grain  without  avail¬ 
able  phosphorus  and  you  may  have  a  big, 
husky  plant,  but  the  grain  will  be  shrunk¬ 
en  or  soft. 
The  Origin. — Here  we  branch  off  into 
geology,  which  T  do  not  pretend  to  know 
much  about.  We  will  just  accept  what 
the  geologists  tell  us  and  let  il  go  at  that. 
They  tell  us  that  practically  all  the  prim¬ 
itive  rocks  from  which  the  soil  was 
originally  made  contain  phosphorus  in 
small  quantities.  Take  up  a  handful  of 
soil  almost  anywhere  and  a  chemist  can 
prove  to  us  that  it  contains  a  touch  or  a 
trace  of  all  the  mineral  substances.  I 
have  no  doubt  that  right  in  your  poorest 
pasture  the  chemist  can  find  traces  of 
lime,  potash,  phosphorus,  iron.  salt,  gold, 
silver — all  or  most  of  the  substances  you 
have  heard  of.  There  may  not  be 
enough  of  these  things  to  pay  you  to  try 
to  mine  them  with  miner's  tools,  but  they 
are  there,  and  you  put  grain  and  potatoes 
and  fruit  trees  or  vines  into  the  soil  to 
dig  them  out  for  you.  Now  while  there 
are  mere  traces  of  these  things  in  your 
soil  you  know  that  there  are  spots  or 
places  on  the  earth  where  these  things 
have  accumulated  iu  great  masses.  There 
is  n«d  enough  salt  in  your  soil  to  give  a 
taste,  hut  there  are  mines  of  solid  salt 
elsewhere,  also  great  mines  of  coal  or 
iron,  or  places  where  copper,  gold,  pot¬ 
ash,  sulphur  and  phosphorus  have  been 
concentrated  or  grouped  together  in 
some  way.  It  does  not  pay  to  mine  for 
these  things  on  your  farm,  though  they 
are  there.  It.  does  pay  to  go  to  the  mines 
where  these  things  have  been  concen¬ 
trated.  dig  them  out  and  distribute  them. 
That  is  why  it  pays  you  to  lot  some  one 
dig  out  the  phosphorus  iu  these  concen¬ 
trated  places,  fit  it  properly,  and  sell  it 
to  you  for  fertilizing.  Naturally  you 
want  to  know  how  that  phosphorus  was 
hunched  together  and  how  best  to  buy  it 
for  your  own  use. 
Concentration. — Here  we  must  take 
what  tla'  scientific  men  tell  us,  or  work 
up  some  theory  of  our  own.  Now  these 
scientists  say  that  in  all  cases  where 
these  masses  of  phosphorus  appear,  plant 
and  animal  life  were  originally  respon¬ 
sible.  Starting  with  the  original  soil, 
phosphorus  was  widely  distributed,  and 
not  at  all  in  groups  or  masses  as  we  now 
find  it.  First  the  plant  and  then  the 
animal  concentrated  it.  and  assisted  by 
nature  deposited  it  where  it  is  now 
found.  As  an  illustration  of  this  theory 
take  the  following  case.  A  farmer  has 
a  pasture  of  ordinary  soil.  You  might  an¬ 
alyze  it  and  find  a  small  quantity  of 
phosphorus  in  it — about:  enough  lo  make 
Blue  grass,  White  clover  and  other  pas¬ 
til  re  phi ul. a  grow.  Those  plants  take  the 
phosphorus  out  of  that  soil  aud  hold  it 
in  their  stem  and  leaves.  It  is  easy  to 
see  that  the  phosphorus  is  very  much 
more  concentrated  in  these  plants  than 
it  was  when  in  the  soil.  Consider  the 
following  table.  A  ton  of  the  soil  would 
only  show  a  very  few  ounces  of  phos¬ 
phorus  scattered  through  it,  while  those 
plants  show  the  following: 
rot  NUB  IN  ONE  TON. 
Plies.  A,  ill. 
Clover  hay . 
.  10 
Timothy  hay . . 
.  11 
Hod-top  . . 
Alfalfa  . 
.  10 
Thus  you  see  the  plants  growing  iu 
that  pasture  concentrate  the  phosphorus  I 
as  compared  with  the  way  it  was  held  in 
the  soil. 
Now  that  farmer  turns  cattle  and 
sheep  into  the  pasture.  They  eat  these 
pasture  grasses  and  make  growth  of  bone  1 
and  body.  By  so  doing  lliey  concentrate  1 
the  phosphorus  still  more.  Whereas  a  ] 
ton  of  clover  Contains  It)  pounds  <d‘  phos¬ 
phoric  acid,  a  ton  of  hone  contains  250! 
So  as  we  see  the  cattle  and  sheep  by  eat¬ 
ing  the  grasses  concentrate  the  phos¬ 
phorus  originally  in  the  soil  still  more. 
Now  suppose  there  comes  an  outbreak  of  j 
foot-and-mouth  disease  and  these  cattle 
arc  attacked.  The  inspectors  at  once 
pounce  upon  the  herd  and  kill  the  ani¬ 
mals.  A  big  ditch  is  dug  and  the  car¬ 
casses  are  tumbled  in,  sprinkled  with 
quicklime  and  buried.  II.  w.  c. 
“IIeixo,  Dobson!  Any  luck  yesterday 
when  you  were  fishing?”  “Great!  1 
was  away  when  six  hill  collectors  called.” 
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