MANURING EXPERIMENTS WITH PADDY RICE. 
27 
With small doses of nitrogen (5—7.5 kilogrms.) in the manure, 
the most complete economy of this nutrient took place in the 
development of the plants, e.g. as large a quantity of organic 
matter as could be formed with the help of the small quantity 
of nitrogen, was actually produced and the percentage amount 
of nitrogenous matters in the ripe crop did not essentially differ 
from that obtained with a manure free from nitrogen but com¬ 
plete in all other respects. From larger doses (10—17.5 kilo¬ 
grms.) of nitrogen in the manure the plants absorbed, of course, 
also more, but the production of organic matter was no longer 
dependent on this nutrient, because the latter no longer 
represented the minimum factor. Other conditions, especially 
light, did not suffice to produce so much as would have 
corresponded to the large amount of nitrogen taken up, and 
as a consequence, the resulting ripe crop turned out to be richer 
in nitrogenous substances, than when small proportions of 
nitrogen were applied. 
As mature seeds represent a complete organism (germ) with 
a small stock of nutrients for its future development, and of 
a limited size, a mixture of organic and mineral substances is 
deposited in them which cannot widely vary in its composition. 
Manures have accordingly far less influence on the composition 
of the grain than on the other parts of the vegetable body in 
which, after maturity, all those substances are left which are 
taken up or assimilated either in excess of the need or too late 
to contribute to the production of seeds. Thus we notice also 
in our trials that the proportions of nitrogenous matters show 
less variation in the grain than in the straw, though a certain 
parallelism between the two is distinctly perceptible. In all 
trials which gave a straw rich in nitrogen, the grain also con¬ 
tains relatively much of it ; while, however, in the former 
the ratio between the lowest and highest contents is 100: 200, 
it is in the latter only 100 : 135. Our researches thus indicate 
that if the straw is to be used for fodder, the supply of nitrogen 
in the manure should not be too small. 
It affords also much interest to ascertain how much of the 
