THB I-i U 1-4 A. L KSW-VORKER 
935 
Soil Fertility Problems 
Fertilizer Problem in Virginia. 
I was interested in the article on fer¬ 
tility of New York State farms on page 
933. The farmers here have that same 
idea of using fertilizer; that it is to be 
used as a last resource and to make the 
soil produce the same amount that it did 
before without fertilizer, and it is there¬ 
fore a dead expense which they did not 
have before. The use of small quantities 
of cheap fertilizer has taught them that 
the principle money crop is wheat and 
yield six to seven bushels per acre with 
200 pounds of acid phosphate alone. 
With this amount of fertilizer the amount 
raised per acre is much smaller than it 
used to be, and getting smaller all the 
time, so they consider all fertilizer no 
good because they have never used any 
that did better. The soil is now run 
down for want of humus and consequent¬ 
ly nitrogen. It is said that years ago 
v hen starting to use acid phosphate it 
made some wonderful crops, but then 
there was more humus in the soil, and 
acid phosphate was what was needed 
alone, and as the nitrogen has been all 
used up and none supplied the yield has 
grown smaller. This is the reason they 
think fertilizer is a dead loss and no 
good. Sometimes an $18 to $20 mixed 
fertilizer is used, which does not do much 
better; 200 pounds of a good mixed fer¬ 
tilizer would make the difference between 
profit and loss. I tell them that the 
same money’s worth of good mixed fertil¬ 
izer, even if it is only 50 pounds, would 
give better results than the same money’s 
worth of acid phosphate alone, even if 
it was 200 or 300 pounds, but that is too 
hard to swallow. I use fertilizer to make 
my soil produce enough more to pay the 
cost of the fertilizer and still give me 
something over. For instance, on land 
that would produce six to seven bushels 
per acre I put 500 pounds of $40 fertil¬ 
izer, costing $10 per acre, which made 
me 22 bushels per acre. Counting, the 
wheat at 00 cents per bushel. 11 bushels 
paid fertilizer bill and I had four bushels 
extra more than I would have had with 
no fertilizer at all, and my soil was in 
better shape after using than it was be¬ 
fore- E. E. s. 
Virginia. 
It. N.-Y.—And the clover will be bet¬ 
ter and thus help all crops. 
Sweet Clover High in Nitrogen. 
While Sweet clover is having its day 
it might be worth while to note how it 
stands in nitrogen content. The follow¬ 
ing materials were collected this Spring 
at a time when they might have been 
turned under for green manure, and the 
analysis made on the green weight basis: 
Sweet clover . 
Alfalfa. 
Winter vetch .. 
Canada field peas .... 
Timothy . 
Wheat ....! 
Rye . 
.701% Nitrogen 
.001% Nitrogen 
.028% Nitrogen 
.540% Nitrogen 
.434% Nitrogen 
.314% Nitrogen 
.290% Nitrogen 
It will be remembered that stable ma¬ 
nure only contains around .5 per cent, of 
nitrogen. From the nitrogen standpoint 
it would appear that The R. N.-Y. was 
conservative in stating that Mr. Chas. 
Black’s crop of Sweet clover turned un¬ 
der was worth eight tons of manure to 
the acre. 
Records at New Jersey Experiment 
Station show that several years ago an 
attempt was made to grow this crop. The 
ground was plowed and elaborate pains 
were taken to give this “weed” royal 
treatment. The Melilotus did not re¬ 
spond. it was a failure. Why this flour¬ 
ishing roadside weed ignored such hand¬ 
some manipulation was a puzzler at the 
time, but is undoubtedly explained by 
Mr. Bloomingdale’s statement (page 870) 
that Sweet clover requires a hard seed 
bed. i.. k. wii.kins. 
New Jersey Experiment Station. 
Alfalfa in Wisconsin. 
A few days ago I sent you a package 
containing some Alfalfa stalks that I 
picked from one of our fields as we were 
cutting it for hay. We made no extra 
effort to get long spears. It was so badly 
lodged that we had to follow the mower 
with forks and throw back the swath so 
as to see where to drive the next round. 
This is the third year that this field has 
been cut since it was seeded this time, 
and we aim to plow and plant to corn 
next Spring. It is 10 years since we be¬ 
gan to grow Alfalfa, and have never 
done anything out of the ordinary good 
culture in way of preparing the soil for 
the seed. 
We take a field that has grown corn 
the previous season, plow and fit the same 
as for any grain crop, and sow from one 
to 114 bushels of barley per acre with 
18 pounds of good Alfalfa seed in a 
broadcast seeder, mixing the seed and 
barley together, and sowing both at one 
operation, dragging with a lever harrow, 
and then roll or plank. We have never 
used any lime or inoculation of any sort. 
The first time this field was seeded I 
sowed one bushel of barley and 18 pounds 
of Alfalfa per acre, and thrashed 31 
bushels of fine barley to the acre; in Sep¬ 
tember cut a nice crop of hay, and the 
following year cut three crops of hay. 
We have never had anything in the 
way of fodder that all kinds of stock rel¬ 
ish as they do this hay. In making the 
hay we like to mow in the afternoon, and 
the next morning as soon as the dew is 
off go over it with a tedder, and as soon 
as suitable rake and put in good-sized 
cocks and cover with haycaps, leave two 
or three days, then on a bright morning 
open up to the sun for two or three hours, 
and it is fit to go into the barn, making 
hay that anything will eat with a relish. 
EVERETT MARTIN. 
Waukesha Co., Wis. 
II. N.-Y.—These Alfalfa stalks were 
dried out when they reached us. yet they 
measured about six feet in length, were 
fine and of excellent quality. 
Poultry Manure on Mangels. 
Do you think that a person can put on 
so much chicken manure around man¬ 
gels that it would make them grow too 
much tops and not enough of the root 
or solid part? Also on cornfields where 
500 pounds of 10-5 or 10-3 fertilizer per 
acre were used each time it was put to 
corn. Will it do much good to put it on 
after the corn is knee-high and the beets 
are four or five inches high, or would 
it be better to put in an orchard where 
you are going to sow rye and some places 
rye and vetch for a cover crop? m. b. 
No doubt of it. We have seen cases 
where too much chicken manure drove 
the crops all to top. There was too large 
a proportion of nitrogen. That is why 
we advise using potash and phosphate 
with the chicken manure. We have fre¬ 
quently put fertilizer on corn that had 
grown “knee high.” That is not the best 
time to fertilize corn, but if the soil is 
reasonably moist the fertilizer will help 
the crop. 
Cover Crops for Orchard. 
Which, in your opinion, will be better 
for an orchard, a cover crop of rye and 
vetch or a thorough mulch of wheat 
straw? This orchard had an application 
<»f the above cover crop last season that 
has been plowed under this year. Can 
an orchard be injured by an over supply 
of nitrogen ? g. g. 
Valley Falls, N. Y. 
With us it would depend upon the 
value of the straw. If we had plenty of 
straw, and the value was not excessive, 
we should use it in the orchard. In most 
Eastern sections straw is worth too much 
to be used as mulch in this way, and in 
the majority of cases it would pay better 
to use the rye and vetch once more. Or¬ 
chards are not usually injured by using 
too much nitrogen, but they are some¬ 
times put back in fruiting. We have 
known of cases where clover was plowed 
into the ground for a number of years 
in succession without much use of potash 
and phosphate. The result was a heavy 
growth of wood in the orchard, and light¬ 
er crops. There was not a good forma¬ 
tion of fruit buds. The trees made a 
very heavy growth, and required constant 
pruning. The setting of fruit was light, 
and while the apples were large, they 
were soft and light-colored. That is usu¬ 
ally the result of using too much nitro¬ 
gen in an orchard, and in case this extra 
growth is shown it would be better to 
stop using vetch or clover, let the or¬ 
chard go back to sod for a year or two, 
and use applications of acid phosphate 
and potash. 
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