April 1, 1907 
THE AUSTRALIAN GARDENER. 
If 
© Lares ¢ 
PURE 
LOLLIES. 
Send your Order to 
JOHN 
WALTON, 
Who'e-ale Manutacturer of every Kind of Choice Sweets, 
"CW FOR SS’ E., Adelaide, 
VICTORIA 
DYE WORKS 
(BE. L. RAY) 
172 Rundle Street 
(Opposite York Hotel) and 
Stephen’s Place, 
(Side of Marshall’s) 
Gentlemen’s Clothes Cleaned or Dyed 
equal to new. 
Feathers Dyed and Curled 
Gloves Cleaned on Shortest Notice. 
Manures. 
Year by year. owing to constant crop- 
ping and want of attention to suitable 
rotations, our soils are becoming deteri- 
ated. Those elements so important to 
the health and life of all field and garden 
¢rops—viz. nitrogen, phosphoric acid, 
and potash—are gradualy but surely being 
diminished quantity, andif not replaced 
by some means or other, the result is in- 
evitably an impoverished soil, and, as a 
natural corollary. an impoverished farmer. 
There are, undoubtedly, soils of such 
surpassing richness in all parts of the 
State that, although some of them, have 
borne over thirty successive wheat crops 
without rest or manure, they still yield 
from 20 to 30 bushels of good grain per 
acre. But allsoils are not so constituted, 
and in order to ‘keep their fertility, the 
manure becomes imperative. Of the 
chemical bodies (writes Mr. Brunnich. 
Agricultural Chemist) carbonic acid, 
water, phosphoric acid. nitrogen, potash. 
lime, magnesia, iron, and sulphuric ‘acid— 
which are all absolutely necessary for the 
growth of a plant—not all need to be 
applied in the form of artificial manures, 
but only those which are shown by prac- 
tical experience. to be more quickly 
exhausted and which are generally found 
in: only small quantities in the soil, as 
phosphoric acid, potash, and nitrogen. 
Our commercial manures are, conse- 
quently, chiefly composed of these chemi- 
cals, their value depending entirely on the 
amount and on the form in which the 
chemical compounds are ‘found in the 
manures. Enormous quantities of arti- 
ficial. manures are used on the Continent 
of Europe. In the Canton of Berne, 
Switzerland, the amount of important 
plant foods put back ou the land in the 
form of stable manure alone amounts to 
4,700 tons of phosphoric acid 24,000 tons 
nitrogen, thus proving that the land was 
‘robbed of more than half of its most 
valuable constituents, for whilst, in ad- 
dition, 1,800 tons phosphoric acid, 240 
tons potash, and 93° ‘tons nitrogen ‘were 
supplied to the land in form of artificial 
manures, the.average crops grown took 
out of the coil 12,000 tons’ phosphoric acid 
41,0C0 tons potash, and 36,000 tons nitro- 
gen. If this happens in a country where 
agriculture has reached a high perfection, 
how much more disastrcus must be the 
result of such cultivation as generally 
practised in our State. Some cf our 
farmers have manured, but it has been 
done in a blindfold and reckless manner. 
The farmer purchased, perhaps, afew bags 
of meatworks‘ manure, superphospate, and 
guano, and applied them alone or mixed 
without getting any result. and, of course, 
wisely abandoned further trials. In con- 
tinuation of this subject, we commend to 
our readers Mr. Brunnich‘s valuable paper 
published in the “Queensland Agricultural 
Journal.“ of October. 1900.. 
Following, we give some further useful 
notes of manure from our exchanges :— 
APPLICATION OF SUPERPHOSPATE TO 
THE WHEAT Crop. 
It used to be a general custom to give 
the crop the benefit of an autumnal 
artificial dressing of two or three cwt. of 
superphosphate just before or at the time 
of sowing, and this is still the practice 
which obtains on the Continent. More- 
ever, it would appear to be in accordance 
with the views of agricultural experts, 
Thus, at Rothamsted, when it is thought 
desirable to apply phosphate of lime, a 
dressing of two cwt. is ploughed in before 
the seeding operation, aud another autho- 
rity recommends an autumn dressing just 
before sowing of two or three cwt. super- 
phosphate per acre. 
As opposed to this plan, the practice 
has grown up in this country of broadcast- 
ing the superphosphate in the spring, 
probably being found more convenient, 
and to answer equally well. 
The wheat plant wants its supply of 
nourishment most when vegetation starts 
after its winter rest, andduring . the 
months of February, March, and April 
(August, September, and October, in our 
State) absorbs about three-fourths of the 
fertilising constituents required’ during 
its whole period of the growth, and it 
oppropriates greedily the quantities not 
only of nitrogen applied as ‘nitrate of 
soda in the spring, but also the soluble 
phosphoric acid of the superphosphates 
and potash. : 
Nitrate of soda, applied alone, acts too 
quickly and with too stimulating a force ; | 
the plant should have at the’ same time 
phosphoric acid available to its rootlets. 
Tt is told of a successful farmer that, 
_ clothed in a loose coat with two enormous 
pockets, one containing nitrate of soda 
and the other superphosphate, he used to 
walk over his fields of wheat in the spring 
and wherever he saw a patch looking 
weakly or yellowish, indicating in- 
sufficient nourishment, he used to spread 
a handfull out of each pocket, with the 
remark that he was mending his crop, 
and, as a matter of fact, he nearly always 
succeeded in gettinga good crop. 
A very suitable dressing is two cwt. 
superphosphate mixed with three-quarters 
of acwt. of sulphate of ammonia, applied 
in June, and followed up in August, if the 
appearance of the growing crops indicate 
the want of it, by three-quarters of cwt. 
of nitrate of soda, : 
Tf the soil is of a chalky character, . 
deficient in potash, three-quarters of a 
cwt. of sulphate of potash should be mixed 
with the superphosphate and. sulphate 
of ammonia, . F 
After heavy rains it may be expected 
that a proportion of the plant foods have 
been washed out of the soil, and therefore 
an artificial supply, such as we have above 
indicated, would seem to be desirable, 
Decomposition or MANURE, 
The decomposition of manure~depends . 
largely upon the amount of moisture in 
the heap When manure is dry the 
chemical changes occur slowly, butZmore 
rapidly when the heap is wet. When 
manure is mixed with a liberal supply of 
absorbeut materials, and stored under 
shelter, it will undergo but litile change, 
but when wanted for use it may be de- 
composed in a short timeifsaturated with | 
urine. If the bedding used‘in the stalls 
is cut fine it will serve the purpose desired - 
fully as well as when uncut, but the main 
advantage is that the fine material may be 
more intimately mixed with manure, and 
will then better absorb the liquids, to’ say 
nothing of the - easier. handling, loading, 
and distribution of the: manure onthe 
fields when the season arrives for spread- 
ing it. Much of the value of manure is 
lost by mismanagement The quantity 
of manure made by a cow in one year is 
very large, ‘especially if all the liquids and 
solids are saved, With the use of litter it 
is claimed that a cow will make a ton of ~ 
manure‘a month, but this’ estimate in- 
cludes the absorbent materials Of « the 
litter, which serve to ‘prevent ‘loss rather 
than to add anything of value to the, 
manure. $e ! 
