BULLETIN OF THE BUSSEY INSTITUTION. 83 
Kinds of Crops.— Each of the manures was tested with three kinds 
of crops; namely, barley, beans, and ruta-bagas, as will appear below. 
Three kinds of crops were chosen, not only for the sake of testing the 
manures with different plants, but in order that some one crop might 
succeed each year, no matter whether the season should be dry or wet. 
Manures.— Upon one division of the experimental field the various 
kinds of lime procurable in Boston were tested, together with gypsum, 
ground oyster-shells (as fine as wheat-flour), spent-lime from gas-works 
and from a soap-boiler, and a mixture of lime and salt. The lime from 
the gas-works was originally oyster-shell lime, but that from the soap- 
boiler, which had served to remove carbonic acid from soda-ash, was 
probably made from the limestone of Rockland, in Maine. A com- 
paratively large quantity of the soap-boiler’s waste was used because 
of the wet and sticky condition in which that material came to hand. 
To one half the division (Section A) the lime or lime-compound was 
applied by itself, while upon the other half (Section AA) the lime 
was admixed with peat. The original purpose of these trials was to 
determine what effect would be produced upon a poor drift soil by 
liming it heavily and repeatedly during a term of years. 
On the next division of the field several potash-compounds, besides 
. fish-scrap, Peruvian guano, and sulphate of ammonia, were contrasted 
with farm-yard manure and Boston stable-manure. Upon one section 
(marked B) of this division the several fertilizers were applied in the 
proportions ordinarily used by farmers, while upon the other section 
(BB) the same kinds of materials were applied in considerably larger 
quantities, with the intention that each square should receive an 
amount of fertilizing material equal in money-cost, as nearly as might 
be, to that put upon each of the other squares. For these comparisons, 
—which, as regards the cost and the amount of the fertilizers to be 
taken, are of course no more than rough approximations to the truth, 
— farm or stable manure was taken as the standard, and $ 12 per cord 
was allowed as the total cost of producing, transporting, and applying 
it. It was applied at the rate of ten cords to the acre. It would 
have been possible, no doubt, to have obtained several of the fertilizers — 
at prices low enough to have permitted their application in decidedly 
larger quantities than were really used. Very much less than an 
equal money-value of fish-scrap was applied to the square numbered 
3, through fear of hurting the crops. 
