Vol. LVI. No. 2478. 
NEW YORK, JULY 24, 1897. 
1.00. PER YEAR 
CHEMICALS, CLOVER AND COWS. 
THE “ EASTING ” POWER OF FERTILIZERS 
What the Cows Have Done. 
[editorial correspondence. | 
“ I have never seen the farm look so much like a 
garden as it does to-day, and it is all due to chemicals 
and clover.” 
The speaker was D. C. Lewis, of Cranbury, N. J. 
He stood in an 18-acre hay field at the lower part of 
his farm. The crop record of this field for the past 
five years is as follows : In 1893, this field was planted 
to corn. It received the yard manure from two teams 
and four cows. The year’s supply of manure was 
spread on this sod during the summer, the whole 
being plowed under in the spring, yielding a heavy 
crop of corn. In 
1894, the field 
was planted to 
potatoes, and 
an application 
of 1,000 pounds 
per acre of the 
Mapes Potato 
fertilizer, and 
200 pounds per 
acre of muriate 
of potash was 
made. The 
yield was 5,000 
bushels of pota¬ 
toes. After the 
potatoes were 
dug, the ground 
was worked up 
and seeded to 
wheat with 400 
pounds per acre 
of grain ferti¬ 
lizer. The 
wheat yielded, 
in 1895, at the 
rate of 34 bush¬ 
els per acre. 
Timothy was 
seeded with the 
wheat, and in 
the spring, 
clover was 
sown on the 
young grain. 
Last year, 
1896, a heavy 
crop of clover 
hay was cut, 
and this year, 
the first mow¬ 
ing yielded not 
less than 23 ^ 
tons per acre of 
fine hay. Thus, 
in one round of a five-years’ rotation, this field has 
produced a heavy crop of corn ; 5,000 bushels of pota¬ 
toes ; 612 bushels of wheat, and 80 tons of hay. These 
crops have been produced from one year’s manure 
from four horses and four cows ; 1,000 pounds of 
fertilizer, and 200 pounds per acre of muriate on the 
potatoes, and 400 pounds of fertilizer per acre on the 
wheat. 
Mr. Lewis may well take pride in his farm for, year 
by year, it has gained in productive power. Eight 
years 8go, we began to write about Chemicals and 
Clover in connection with Mr. Lewis’s farm. There 
were many who thought the story a mere fairy tale. 
The plan of selling hay and grain and keeping only 
enough stock to provide power and milk seemed 
entirely wrong to some good farmers, who were cer¬ 
tain that the continued use of fertilizers would, event¬ 
ually, give results harmful to the soil. I wish that 
these skeptics might be able to see the farm to-day 
and observe how, with each round of the rotation, 
the soil has responded with increased crops. 
“ Ah ! ” but some one will say, “ they are keeping 
more stock than ever before ! That will account 
for it 1 ” 
I told, last year, how and why Mr. Lewis had de¬ 
cided to increase his herd of cows. The money crop 
of this farm is potatoes. That is the crop that re¬ 
ceives all the fertilizer. The bulky crop is corn, which 
received all the manure. When potatoes brought a 
fair price, these farmers felt that they could neglect 
the corn stalks. They were cut and shocked in the 
usual manner. Some were sold to dairymen at a low 
price, four cows had all they would eat, and many 
tons were thrown into the yard for the hogs to work 
over. It was not thought worth while to go to the 
expense and labor required to utilize all the food 
value in the stalks. 
The low price of potatoes in recent years has greatly 
diminished farm incomes in this part of New Jersey. 
Mr. Lewis’s farm was producing about all it would 
profitably yield. The thing to do was to save the 
wasted food material in the corn stalks. A creamery 
was started in Cranbury for the benefit chiefly of 
farmers like Mr. Lewis, who wish to keep a small 
herd of cows to eat up the roughage of their farms 
which cannot be sold for anything like its feeding 
value. These farmers would not think of feeding 
Timothy hay to their cows and, in most cases, they 
can sell theirclover hay at a profit. All the corn stalks 
are cut ud and fed to cows, and in some years, part of 
the clover will be fed at home. Part of the corn is 
sold to buy bran and oil meal to feed with the stalks. 
The 16 acres of corn grown last year provided stalks 
for feeding 11 cows through the winter. A good silo 
would enable them to feed this herd from six acres of 
corn. 
It is always difficult to change at once from potato 
farming to dairying. On a farm where all the land 
has been run in a regular rotation, there is no suit¬ 
able pasture. Last year, Mr. Lewis fenced off a part 
of the clover fields for a pasture, but this year, he is 
soiling the cows on green oats and peas. This crop 
was sown on a strip through the field that fell this 
year to potatoes. This field is really the heaviest on 
the farm, and 
better suited to 
grass than any 
other. After 
haying, the 
cows will be 
turned on the 
meadows. After 
all, the best soil¬ 
ing crop for 
such a farm is 
corn ensilage. 
A silo will 
feed the cows 
through the hot 
weather when 
pastures and 
meadows are 
dry, without in¬ 
terfering with 
any crop in the 
rotation. 
This creamery 
a t Cranbury 
has proved yery 
useful to near¬ 
by farmers. 
They are hand¬ 
ling just twice 
as much milk 
as they were at 
this time last 
year. New 
patrons are 
coming con¬ 
stantly, and 
these fertilizer 
farmers are 
gradually in¬ 
creasing their 
herds. Dairying 
is, with them, 
entirely a side 
issue. “Enough 
cows to eat up 
the stalks.” That is about the prevailing idea Hay 
promises to be very cheap this year and, probably, 
some clover will be fed at home, and to this extent, 
more cows will be kept. The chief office of the cow 
on these fertilizer farms is to turn the cheap roughage 
into money. The creamery puts ready money into 
circulation, and enables the farmers to sell some¬ 
thing every day in the year. The cow makes a good 
partner for chemicals. She is a factory in which 
waste raw materials are made over into a finished and 
salable product. In these days, no man can afford to 
have any wastes on the farm. 
It must be remembered, however, that the cows are 
not yet to be credited with any of the farm’s increased 
productiveness. Formerly, there were four cows; 
now there are 11. Formerly, most of the stalks went 
