282 
MOV. 3 
THE 
RURAL NEW-YORKER. 
Jatm (£rtmomji. 
COMMERCIAL FERTILIZERS. 
Number 2. 
BY FBOFESSOB LEVI 8TOCKBBXDGE. 
In the article, “ Farm-yard Manure,” the atate- 
ment wa* made, that but a small part of its bulk 
or mass wa* of any real value in feeding plants, 
and even that was worthless for this purpose 
until it had been set free from the compound by 
decomposition; that the valuable elements in 
forma without the crude mass, were at least aa 
good and effective aa plant-food aa when com¬ 
bined therewith ; and that the available quantity 
of manure is utterly insufficient to sustain the 
producing powers of our farm land* by our pres¬ 
ent system of culture. 
By stern necessity, then, we are driven to sub¬ 
stitute the elements in other forms for manure, 
or have to see our soils deteriorate until their 
crops w ill not psy the cost of cultivation. It is 
■wise to embrace the former alternative, and to 
make “commercial fertilizers" the substitute. 
By commercial fertilizer at this point, all those 
manufactured substanoes are not intended which 
we find on the market and which are known 
under that general name, but specially as “ phos¬ 
phates," " superphosphates," “ superphosphates 
of lime," “ amraoniated superphosphates,"artifi¬ 
cial “ gnarios," with various names; but the dif¬ 
ferent available forms, or salts, of Potash, Phos¬ 
phoric Acid and Nitrogen, which are manufac¬ 
tured and placed in the market by commercial 
enterprise, and known as chemical products, of 
specific composition and quality. To show the 
necessity of lhe use of these elements in the At¬ 
lantic States, facts almost without number might 
be given ; such as sterile and abandoned farms, 
the inability of the general soil to produce oer- 
taiu staple crops in quantity and quality as in 
early times, and the gradual decrease in yields per 
acre. But one fact alone is sufficient to convince 
the most skeptical, and make this an accepted 
position. By the statistics of Massachusetts for 
1875, which were gathered with great care and 
accuracy, it is shown that all the manure made 
in the State annually, in country, town, and city, 
would give to each acre of its tillage land but a 
little more than half a cord—a quantity which, 
oombmed with the best tillage and system of ro¬ 
tation. ootild not by any possibility sustain its 
power of production. In this respect, Massa¬ 
chusetts is no worse, but in probably better off 
than any other State. 
It is, therefore, for the interest of each indi¬ 
vidual farmer and of the whole countty, that 
commercial fertilizers, as above explained, should 
supplement yard manure in feeding crops, and 
the greater the extent of their use, the better 
for all, provided tney are employed judiciously 
and intelligently. At this late day, it hardly 
seems neoessary to go over the whole ground and 
recount the great numbers of experiments w hich 
have been conducted by many different investi¬ 
gators under widely varying circumstances, 
which prove conclusively that, as a general rule, 
the three elements named are sufficient to pro¬ 
duce plants, and that in increasing quantity, 
year after year, on the same land; but it is im¬ 
portant to the practical farmer to know some¬ 
thing of the different forms in which they may 
be obtained, and their comparative value and 
usefulness in those forms. 
Phosphoric acid is found as a natural product, 
combined with lime and other alkalis, and with 
iron. The former is the combination generally 
used, and m the form of bones, the nodular de¬ 
posits of the Charleston basin, or apatite and 
phosphoiite rooks. Iu either cf these native 
forms, the acid is not readily available, even 
when the masses containing it are reduced to 
powder ; but it is so exceeding slow of develop¬ 
ment by natural process from the three last- 
named compounds, that it will hardly pay the 
cost of transportation and application. Iu other 
words, insoluble acid, in tiie mineral form, the 
farmer cannot afford to purchase; but in the 
form of bone finely ground, it is slowly developed 
in the soil or compost heap, and is of consider¬ 
able value. As a matter of economy and satis¬ 
faction, however, in the latter case, but espe¬ 
cially witli the mineral phosphates, the acid 
sought should be made solvent by treating the 
substances, when brought to the condition of 
powder, with sulphuric acid, and the purchaser 
should always know the percentage of solvent 
aoid iu his purchase, and pay ouly for that at its 
market price. 
Potash can be readily obtained iu the market 
as a salt, combined either with muriatic, sulphu¬ 
ric, nitric, or carbonic acid. The two first are 
the forms in which it is generally used as a fer¬ 
tilizer, because it is cheaper and in good physi¬ 
cal condition for this purpose; in these forms, 
it is a product of tile German mines, and practi¬ 
cally exhaustle88. Where wood Is used for fuel, 
potash can be obtained in the form of ashes 
mingled with other mineral elements, and may 
be estimated at about four pounds of potash ptr 
bushel of ashes, though the per cent, will vary 
somewhat, with the variety of wood consumed. 
This material may be considered a home, rather 
than a commercial product; hut it is one of the 
best forms in which to obtain this alkali, and in 
consequence of the variety of minerals therein, 
it is one of the best manures, though not a com¬ 
plete one. 
Nitrogen, the remaining element, is very abun¬ 
dant in nature; but as a commercial or chemical 
product, it may be produced in the form of salts 
of ammonia, nitrate of soda, dried blood and 
meat, or fish guano, at reasonable prices, and in 
quantity to meet any ordinary demands. 
In the use of commercial fertilizers, tho per¬ 
plexing questions to the farmer often arc: What 
be needs and what to buy ; what are the wants 
of a special field or crop, and what will supply 
them ? Should he procure a superphosphate, or 
a potash salt, or a nitrogenous substance ? Now 
it is the fact that fine crops ar« often grown 
where only one element of plant-food is applied; 
but this does not prove that that element, wag a 
perfect manure, supplied all the wants of, and 
produced the crop. A crop will not grow to per¬ 
fect development, in natural condition, unless it 
can obtain all the elements its nature requires ; 
if, therefore, the farmer applies but one, the 
crop cither fails to grow, or it obtains the other 
elements from the soil which is left that much 
the poorer. To illustrate:—A farmer lias a field 
which is scantily supplied with potash and has a 
good supply of the other minerals ; but it fails 
to y ield paying crops because nitrogen is defi¬ 
cient. He purchases and applies the single ele¬ 
ment in one of its many forms, possibly in tbat 
of fish guano. The result to the farmer is a fine 
crop: to the land, after one or two years of auch 
treatment, the result is sterility; for the appli¬ 
cation of the nitrogen enabled the crop to take 
the last particle of available potaab, and the con¬ 
tinued application of nitrogen produces no re¬ 
sults. If the farmer knew what was the deficient 
element in each of his fields, at the time he wish¬ 
ed to crop them, then he could bo permanently 
successful by using single elements ; but he does 
not, and owing to his circumstances, it is abso¬ 
lutely impossible that he should. Therefore, his 
wisest course—that which w ill oftenest and moat 
permanently make him paying returns for the 
outlay. iB not to apply the elements singly, but 
to compound them, using the three which have 
been named. Yet it is possible that purely ran¬ 
dom compounding, without any principle or sys¬ 
tem, may be but little better than the aiugle ele¬ 
ment application; for by it one element might 
be given in superabundance, and another in defi¬ 
cient quantity to supply the natural wants of the 
plant- Consequently, in compounding the ele¬ 
ments, the want or composition of the special 
crop to be produced, should generally determine 
the proportion of the different elements to lie 
used, and when thus proportioned, they may, so 
far aa the feeding of crops is concerned, be eon- 
sideied a perfect manure. 
Many persons entertain the opinion that com¬ 
mercial fertilizers are simply atimulitnts ; that 
they act on the soil, with results similar to 
those of alcohol on the animal, producing for 
a limited time unnatural activity, to bo succeeded 
by great exhaustion. In the soil, great crops for 
a very short time, then sterility. As a real fact, 
this is aa impossibility, for all the elements 
named, are actual food, genuine nutrition to the 
plant, and any case which in its final results ap¬ 
pears to be similar, is the result of the use of 
single elements, and has been fully explained. 
But the elements compounded and applied, 
with a judicious system of tillage and rotation, 
will result in not only fiue crops, but general im¬ 
provement and fertility of soil. 
Among fa rmers there is a very general distrust 
of commercial fertilizers because, as is alleged, 
they are so universally adulterated that the busi¬ 
ness is one or fraud and deception. It is un¬ 
doubtedly true that absolutely worthless arti¬ 
cles, and known to be such by the seller, have 
been bargained to farmers as of great value, and 
others with a good name have been nearly w orth¬ 
less on account of mixture of base materials. So, 
too, gross frauds are practiced in a large propor¬ 
tion of the necessities and luxuries of life, such 
as tea, coffee, sugar, butter, cloth, and liquors. 
And it will always he so, more or less, in spite of 
moral and legal restraints, until the millenium. 
But the fact is not an argument against the usb 
of fertilizers, any more than it is against that of 
coffee and woolen cloth, but it should be a pow¬ 
erful iuduoemeut in making all whose necessities 
require the use of those articles, to thoroughly 
understand their qualities, characteristics, and 
uses, and to be able to detect the fraudulent, the 
base and worthless. And just here is one of the 
difficulties of the case ; the ignorance of a ma¬ 
jority of the farmers of the simple principles of 
fertilization and of the special wants of their 
soils and crops. Many a fertilizer has been pro¬ 
nounced a fraud and condemned as worthless, 
which was honestly made, was exactly what it 
was represented to be, and if used as its manu¬ 
facturer intended it should be, would produce 
the Btated results. The farmer found it practi¬ 
cally worthless because ho applied it where it 
was not needed, either by the Boil or crop. This 
whole matter is clearly shown by a single case: 
A farmer has a field, the soil of which is much 
reduced, for which he has no yard-manure, and 
decides to cultivate it in corn, using fertilizers. 
He intends it also for an instructive experiment., 
and applies to one part of it muriate of potash, 
and to another a simple superphosphate. On 
the portion where the potash is applied, a fine 
crop is produced ; but on that which received 
the superphosphate, it is very poor. He at once 
coucludeR, and so confidently states, that the su¬ 
perphosphate was wort hless, ** the manufacturer 
of it a villain,” and the experiment has proved 
it. But he is too fast. His superphosphate 
might have been pod* cr it might have been a 
first-class article of its kind, hut the experiment 
has proved nothing in relation to it; it has 
proved, however, that his land needed potash, 
and it is highly probable that if he had mixed 
his two elements, the crop on the whole field 
would have been better than it was on that which 
received the potash. 
The foregoing is notan imaginary case, neither 
iB it by any means a solitary odo. Manufactur¬ 
ers of fertilizers may often be great sinnerB, but 
it is also true that they are often sinned against. 
Two things will, to a groat extent, remedy the 
whole difficulty. First, as exact a knowledge on 
the part of the farmer of the materials he re¬ 
quires to work into plantB as is possessed by Ibe 
mechanic and artisan of the materials they use 
iu their operations. And second, place the man¬ 
ufacture and sale of fraudulent or adulterated 
fertilizers, in the same category as other frauds. 
Whatever may lie (ho special material put upon 
the market, be it of high or low grade, worthless 
or valuable, require its manufacturer aud seller, 
by legal enactment with heavy penalties, lo state 
v'hal he sells, and sell wh.nl he states. The hon¬ 
est manufacturer and the farmer have a common 
—an identical—interest iu this matter; and the 
siiino confidence should exist between them that 
is enjoyed by men engaged in other branches of 
legitimate business and trade ; aud if it could 
be, their mutual interest would be thereby pro¬ 
moted, as well as that of the whole community. 
Mass. Ag. College. 
Jam topics, 
JOTTINGS AT KIRBY HOMESTEAD. 
BY COL. F. D. CURTIS. 
Everybody has been saying that we should 
have an early fall, because the spring was early. 
They said nature keeps up an equilibrium in the 
weather and seasons. Well, this may all be so, 
but hero it is the middle of October, and no frost 
yet—on the contrary, fiue growing weather. We 
aro all regretting that the buckwheat was sowed 
so soon- “ Before the tent h of J uly.” is the rule, 
but this year the early-fall notion hurried in the 
buckwheat about the first of July, just in time 
to be ripening when the sun was the hottest aud 
the ground the driest. A half crop is the result. 
If we had waited two weeks later, undoubtedly 
there would have been double the crop. 
Esquire Davidson has a great prejudice against 
buckwheat. He says he raised a little last year 
and it poisoned his sheep. Their lips swelled up 
and cracked open, and they were sore about their 
eyes, and it took nearly all winter for them to 
get over it. Buckwheat straw will poison the 
skin of pigs when they lie in it, and it never 
should be given to them for bedding. He has 
no doubt it will irritate the skin of sheep if they 
should feed upon it. Our sheep have run in a 
buckwheat stubble without any harm coming to 
them, and as for the straw, we have bedded their 
stables with it without any detrimeut to them, 
as the sheep did not eat the straw auy more 
than they did the stubble. We suspect the Es¬ 
quire’s sheep were poisoned by eating St. JohnV 
wort—a very irritating weed for sheep, and one 
they seem very much inclined to eat. The sore¬ 
ness is just such as would be caused by St. 
Johu's-wort. This weed grows in old pastures, 
aud the Esquire's sheep ran all summer iu a lot 
of this kind. The graiu of buckwheat is excel¬ 
lent feed for either sheep or pigs. Mixed with 
corn or oats, it is very healthy and fattening for 
sheep, or they will do well on clear buckwheat. 
When fed to pigs, it ought to be cooked or soak¬ 
ed. For young pigs, it is capital food ; for hens, 
there is nothing better. A meal of buckwheat 
cakes will “ stand by" a wood chopper on a cold 
day louger than anythiug else. The cakes are 
slow to digest, and nutritious. Some people can¬ 
not eat buckwheat in any form without affecting 
their blood and producing eruptions on the skin. 
Such persons should not eat it; but to those 
with whom it agrees, buckwheat is a cheap and 
excellent food. Buckwheat flour is now less than 
half the price of wheaten, and this reduoed ooBt 
will be a great consideration during the coming 
winter. Mr. Connor says three and a half bush¬ 
els of the gray buckwheat will make a hundred¬ 
weight of flour. It takes four bushels of the 
common grain to make the same amount. The 
kernel of the gTav is smaller, hut the skin or 
hull is not so thick. There is nothing like buck¬ 
wheat to subdue a rough or weedy piece of 
ground. The seed germinates quickly and gets 
ahead of the grass or weeds, and then the dense 
shade of the growing grain soeffectually screens 
the ground as to choke out aDy other growth. 
This plant, as we farmers any. draws largely 
from the air, hence it is not exhaustive to the 
soil, but leaves it in a clean and friable condi¬ 
tion for other crops. Sowing buckwheat, we 
think, is a kind of practical and payiDg summer¬ 
fallowing. Our crop was grown on a meadow', 
killed out by the drought of last year. On the 
moBt of it we first cut the grain and then plowed 
it up and sowed the buckwheat. This we call a 
“ clear-gain crop." On a portion of the meadow 
the grass was turned under, and on this part the 
buckwheat was nearly twice as heavy as it was 
on the rest, where the grass was taken off. 
The oalves were taught yesterday to eat pump¬ 
kins in five minutes. They were fed no salt for 
a week, and then pumpkins were carried to them 
in the field f nd being broken open, salt was 
spriukled on the halves, and without delay tho 
calves began to lick and eat them, and never 
stopped until they were all gone. To-day they 
are catiDg them without any salt. Wo expect 
to keep tho calves in good growing condition on 
the pumpkins and grass until the frost injures 
the latter, when they must bo brought up nights 
and fed some sort of meal with a little hay. 
Ground oats is the best single grain to give to 
calves; but a mixture of corn aud buckwheat, 
or corn and wheat bran, will do well. Never 
feed clear corn meal. It is too heatiug for such 
young animals, and will surely break down their 
digestion. Ono part corn meal, two parts wheat 
bran and half a part of oil meal, is a very healthy 
and nutritious feed for young calves. This mixt¬ 
ure oontaius all the elements required for a vig¬ 
orous and wholesome growth. The oalves may 
be taught to eat meal by sprinkling a little Balt 
on it. Put the meal iu a pail or box with the 
salt on it, and place it by the calves. Their cu¬ 
riosity will lead them to smell of it, and tasting 
and eating will soon follow. Oalves should never 
be allowed to run down iu the fall, as they surely 
will, if not housed aud fed extra when the cold 
nights aud windy days come. 
Oh! the rats! The meanest and dirtiest beaBt 
iu the world is a rat. If they did not know so 
much, it would not he so bad. Traps will not do 
it; they are too cunning. Ttio other night one 
of them walked right past a recent invention 
said to be certain to catch them daintily baited, 
too—and stealing up out of the cellar into a 
hack room, seized a poor, innooeut litt le Guinea 
pig and ran with its victim squealing terribly, 
to its hole. Another rat stole a whole clutch of 
Dorking chickens before wo knew it. When we 
threshed the oats, they were badly cut up by the 
rats. The idea of feeding all of them through 
the long winter, is not satisfactory at all. We 
shall try poison; we must. The compounds of 
phosphorus are the safest to use. They must 
be freshly made, or they will not answer the 
purpose. 
Fairs will make chickenB sick. The close con¬ 
finement and the worry and excitement are cer¬ 
tain to give some of them the roup. We found 
agame rooster, a few days after the fair, stand¬ 
ing around in by-places, with his head all turned 
black, his crop empty aud his breast-bone as 
sharp as a knife. His head was bathed with tur¬ 
pentine and alcohol, aud a couple of drops put 
into his mouth. This changed tho black cok r of 
the comb and wattles to a bright-red, and now 
that rooster Is well. A Dorking was worse, if 
anything, and he, treated in the same way, is 
also well. A fowl is never healthy when its head 
is black ; the turpentine and alcohol being both 
an irritant and stimulant, open the pores of the 
comb and wattles, and through them excite ac¬ 
tion in the other functions of the body. 
The past season has been notable aa the year 
of blight. We do not think that in the memory 
of man has there been such a variety of rust 
and blight. Mr. Elliott informs me that all the 
leaves on his carrots were killed. We have had 
blight on pears, two kinds of blight on potatoes, 
beets, grapes, peas, oats, barley, aud apples; 
carrots make another. 
We observe that Mr. Albbich of Massachu¬ 
setts, is going to sell his large herd of Swiss cat¬ 
tle. This sale will probably result in scattering 
them over the country, when their adaptation 
for the dairy Can be tested, as also their fitness 
for different sections of the country. Their 
strong limbs and big muscles, developed by 
climbing to their Alpine pastures, will enable 
them to feed upon our roughest lands, and their 
5 
