1912. 
THE RURAL, NEW-YORKBR 
119 
THE HOME MIXING OF FERTILIZER. 
The first requisite in business is to 
economize, and if the farmer can mix 
his own fertilizers at home and get bet¬ 
ter results thereby, and also save con¬ 
siderable money, he is certainly making 
rapid advancement along the right lines 
of economy. The Ohio Experiment Sta¬ 
tion showed in a series of experiments 
that it not only pays in dollars and cents 
to mix fertilizer at home, but home- 
mixed goods actually give better yields 
than factory mixed brands of the same 
class when specially adapted to the needs 
of the soil. I have long known the value 
of home-mixing of fertilizers, but was 
never able to give it a trial until about 
12 years ago I influenced (or a brother 
rather did) a number of farmers of our 
locality to go in with us and buy a car¬ 
load of the different ingredients and mix 
our own fertilizer for wheat. This was 
the year there was an entire wheat 
failure all over our State. I was not 
disheartened at the trial, for my clover 
was very fine the following Spring. I 
was never able to buy the separate in¬ 
gredients in carload lot until three years 
ago. Previous to this we formed a club 
and purchased our ready-mixed fertilizer 
in carload lots at a great saving. There 
is only one instance where I don't be¬ 
lieve it pays to home-mix fertilizer, and 
that is where a farmer here and there 
is interested and he cannot find others 
who will club with him and buy in car¬ 
load lots. If but one farmer in a com¬ 
munity is -interested he can hardly buy 
the separate parts cheaply enough, since 
he will necessarily buy in small quan¬ 
tities, to justify him in his efforts. 
Some persons have the idea that the 
ings in them. In the factory mixed 
goods there is always some filler, as 
muck, sand, tobacco stems or other sim¬ 
ilar materials added to make bulk. This 
is _ not necessary. Some agents claim 
this matter is added that the fertilizer 
will sow more easily. We never add 
any filler. It is not necessary. Others 
say add that if any fertilizer is left over 
and put in the barn it will draw damp¬ 
ness and become lumpy. We have stored 
and kept from one year until the next 
some of this fertilizer, and have never 
had the least trouble on that score. Quite 
often we find the potash very lumpy. In 
that event we roll and tumble the sack 
over the floor before opening, and in 
this way many of the rock-like pieces 
are broken, then we open and empty the 
bag and crush more of the large lumps 
with our tamper. 
No attempt has been made here to 
prescribe certain formulas, but rather to 
attempt to impress the importance of 
home mixing. To compound fertilizer 
best adapted to your particular soil can 
be best learned by writing for free bul¬ 
letins published by your experiment sta¬ 
tion. 1 ersonally this kind of fertilizer 
has given such good results at such a 
close price that we shall certainly con¬ 
tinue to use it and bend our influence 
to have our farmer friends try it out. 
IRA G. SHELLABARGER. 
Miami Co., Ohio. 
The Single Land Tax 
Is it true as reported that the revenues 
of the city of Vancouver, B. C., are raised 
through the laud tax alone? 
It is not correct to say that Vancouver 
has adopted the single tax. What it has 
done is to apply single tax principles to 
the raising of that portion of its revenue 
THE OUTFIT FOR MIXING FERTILIZER. Fig. 37. 
mixing of the fertilizer is a very diffi¬ 
cult and laborious task, but nothing 
could be more absurd. The operation is 
a simple one indeed. Fig. 37 shows all 
apparatus necessary save a pair of scales 
of some kind, which are not shown. The 
picture shows' three separate piles of the 
materials, which when mixed will go to 
make up a fertilizer to be used on to¬ 
bacco ground, this to be followed by 
wheat and clover. Aside from the fer¬ 
tilizer materials are one scoop shovel, 
one garden shovel, a broom, a half- 
bushel measure and an ordinary sand 
screen and tamper. All these utensils 
are inexpensive and can be procured at 
any hardware store. The picture shows 
all the mixing process being conducted 
on the barn floor, but in the absence 
of a similar floor a few boards fitting 
tightly together can be laid down, which 
will answer very well, but in the absence 
of these an ordinary mortar box as 
used by plasterers or masons can be 
used, or the wagon bed. 
Weigh out the proper amount to be 
mixed at one time. We usually mix 
about 1,200 pounds at each mixing. Pour 
the materials on the mixing platform, 
one on top of the other, then with the 
shovel turn the whole mass over as in 
mixing concrete. When all is turned 
once then screen the whole bulk by 
shoveling into the pile and throw up 
against the screen shown. The finer par¬ 
ticles will go through the openings and 
the coarse, hard lumps will fall at the 
bottom of the screen. Occasionally take 
the tamper and mash these hard parti¬ 
cles. Then sift the pulverized parts 
again. Now remove the screen and 
shovel over once more—twice more 
would be better, then bag. Fertilizer 
mixed thus makes a very fine and easy- 
to-sow fertilizer. Only one person in 
our locality complained about the fer¬ 
tilizer thus mixed being hard to sow 
and that was in a corn planter. Just 
what the trouble was we do not know 
unless the nitrate and potash were not 
thoroughly pulverized and the openings 
in the plates used had too small open¬ 
levied on realty values; that is, it has 
exempted improvements entirely from 
taxation, and based the taxing of realty 
on land values only. The great bulk of 
the city’s revenues are provided by this 
tax, and this, strictly speaking, is the 
only tax levied for purely revenue pur¬ 
poses. A special license fee is charged 
saloons, dairies, and certain other busi¬ 
nesses, being rather matters of police 
and health regulation than anything else. 
So far as the city is concerned, the ordi¬ 
nary business man and the ordinary 
householder has only the tax on his land 
to pay. Other taxes are levied by the 
Provincial Government, viz., income, per¬ 
sonal property, and the poll tax, and the 
Dominion Government derives its rev¬ 
enue from excise and customs duties. 
It follows, therefore, that before single 
tax can be completely operative in Van¬ 
couver, the two governments named must 
also base their revenues on land values. 
The system cannot be said, as yet, to 
have had any effect on the general cost 
of living, but it has been in operation 
only two years, and those two years 
have been synchronous with a tremen¬ 
dous expansion, causing the demand for 
business and residential accommodation, 
also necessaries of life, to exceed the 
supply very greatly. It follows that the 
anticipated effects in the way of reduc¬ 
tion of rentals, owing to the penalizing of 
holders of vacant property and the en¬ 
couragement given to investors to build, 
has not yet had time to make itself felt; 
but the great increase in building activ¬ 
ity, partly due directly to the change in 
the system of taxation, gives promise of 
such an amelioration, which, in its turn, 
will undoubtedly have a tendency to re¬ 
duce the cost of living. The customary 
arguments against the exemption of im¬ 
provements have been raised here as 
elsewhere. I consider it a gross injus¬ 
tice for the States to levy taxes on im¬ 
provements, as it does not encourage an 
owner to improve his property. I be¬ 
lieve Seattle and Tacoma are taking up 
the single tax proposition. 
British Columbia. w. hankin. 
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