118 
FLORIDA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 
growing crops or on soil that was dry 
and inclined to be thirsty, very little good 
would be derived from its use. 
LEATHER SCRAP. 
There is always some one on the look¬ 
out for something that they can put on 
the market at a less price than the market 
is paying and still give them a good profit. 
It has been known for a good many years 
that leather contained a considerable 
quantity of ammonia and it was also 
known that a piece of leather will re¬ 
main in the ground for years and the 
plant would be no better for its being 
there as the ammonia \vas irert. The 
demand for ammoniates has caused a 
number of experiments with leather to 
be made and different methods have been 
used to put it into marketable shape. This 
has been effectually done during the last 
few years. The leather is scorched and 
pulverized and treated in different ways 
so from the appearance you would never 
recognize it as once being leather. The 
nostril is the only means of detecting it. 
Notwithstanding all the treatment you 
give it it still holds the leather odor. In 
some states it is against the law for 
fertilizer manufacturers to use leather 
scrap as a source of ammonia in their 
goods and it is well that it is so. A man¬ 
ufacturer who uses leather scrap can 
guarantee a given analysis and the chem¬ 
ist will bear him out in the guarantee by 
showing the fertilizer to contain that 
amount but the plant would be unable to 
assimilate any very large portion of the 
ammonia. As ammonia in leather scrap 
is sold considerably below the market of 
other ammoniates it is very easy to un¬ 
derstand why a brand of fertilizer can be 
cheaper than another and yet have the 
same analysis. While an analysis is a 
good method of recognizing the value of 
a fertilizer the true value is the ability 
of the plant to utilize or assimilate it un¬ 
der climatic and soil conditions in which 
it is used, io per cent, ammonia from 
leather scrap would not give the grower 
of lettuce and cabbage one-half the ser¬ 
vice that 5 per cent, from nitrate of soda 
or dried blood would. 
GUANO. 
One of the first fertilizers used to any 
extent in this country in a commercial 
way was Peruvian guano which was im¬ 
ported from Peru. The first deposits that 
were discovered had been hundreds of 
years in accumulating and were thor¬ 
oughly rotted, frequently analyzing as 
high as 12 per cent, ammonia. When 
this grade of guano was used on the gar¬ 
den the results were wonderful as the 
ammonia, owing to the long time the de¬ 
posits had been there was in an available 
form. The demand for Peruvian guano 
soon exhausted the supply of the higher 
grade goods. -It is now very seldom that 
we find guano analyzing io per cent, am¬ 
monia on the market. There are guanos 
offered that analyze from 2 to 8 per cent, 
ammonia, from 8 to 18 per cent, phos¬ 
phoric acid and from i to 2 per cent, 
potash. 
At different times we hear considerable 
about bat guano that has been discovered 
in caves on different islands. This guano 
when it is in caves that are perfectly dry 
is a very valuable article often analyzing 
as high as 17 per cent, ammonia, but 
there are very few caves of this kind, in¬ 
deed nearly all of them, contain more or 
less moisture. When the guano becomes 
wet with lime water the chemical action 
is to free the ammonia, consequently it is 
of very little value. Those buying bat 
guano should only buy it on a guaranteed 
analysis as one ton may be worth $40 
while another would be dear at $5. 
