QUALITY OF BARLEY GROWN AFTER ROOTS. 293 

in a highly available condition for the plant, the nitrogen 
and the potash particularly being mainly in a soluble form. 
Some loss of nitrogen may result from “denitrification ” 
(see Kriiger and Schniedewind, Landw. Jahr. XXIX., 747, 
for an experiment bearing on this point), but the appearance 
of the growth always points to a superabundance of nitrogen. 
It is evident that not only is the manure available for the 
crop large in quantity, but it is also very badly balanced ; 
the excess of nitrogen will produce an extreme vegetative 
development, an immediate flush of flaggy growth with a 
weak straw, and a tendency to late ripening, while the 
phosphoric acid, which is particularly connected with the 
development and ripening of the grain, bears only a small 
proportion to the other manurial materials. 
Although it is difficult to remedy the effect of the tilth and 
the late seeding in the case of barley after roots, it may be 
possible to modify the ill-balanced manuring, and by the use 
of quick-acting phosphatic manures to correct the more or 
less abnormal growth induced by the excess of nitrogen and 
potash. Of course there will generally be a residue of 
phosphatic manure in the soil from the dressing used for the 
swede crop, which is highly phosphatic ; still, this residue 
may not be sufficiently available for a plant with a short 
period of growth like barley. Experiments on these lines 
have been conducted by the South-Eastern Agriculturat 
College at Wye during the past four years, at first on small 
plots, but during the last two years on comparatively large 
fields; in addition to dressings of superphosphate, trials 
have been made with sulphate of potash and salt, as being 
often recommended and used when barley is taken after | 
roots. 
As the experiments were mainly concerned with the 
quality of the barley, the grain was subjected to a thorough 
examination in the laboratory, and the tables which follow 
show the composition of twenty-one samples of barley thus 
grown in 1899. The characters of most importance in 
deciding upon the quality of the sample are the weight 
per bushel, or better the weight of 100 grains, the 
proportion of starch and nitrogen, and the proportion of 
