300 BULLETIN OF THE BUSSEY INSTITUTION. — 
No. 14.—A Record of Trials of various Fertilizers upon the 
Plain-field of the Bussey Institution. By F. H. STORER, 
Professor of Agricultural Chemistry. fourth Report. 
Results obtained in 1874. 
Tue special purpose of the field experiments of 1874 was to con- 
trol the results obtained in 1873 upon the plots to which various 
mixtures of fertilizers had been applied. (See pages 116 to 182 of this 
“ Bulletin.”) 
A large number of trials made with “special” or single fertilizers in 
the previous years, 1871 and 1872, had shown that the land allotted 
to the experiments stood in particular need of one kind of plant food 
(see page 115); and an additional set of trials made in 1873 with 
mixed fertilizers had served to indicate in a measure the general 
capabilities of the land. The experiments of 1874 were repetitions of 
these last, made, as has just been said, for the sake of obtaining a 
second set of results proper to be contrasted with the first set, and 
which might serve to confirm them or to disprove them, as the case 
might be. 
The character of the soil and subsoil of the experimental field has 
been described on page 80. As there explained, the field is covered 
with a thin layer of loam that rests upon a deep bed of coarse gravel. 
The position of the plots devoted to the trials now in question will be 
seen upon the diagram on page 118, at the left aud top of the diagram. 
Each of these plots bore the same kinds of crops in 1874 as in 1873, 
excepting that no ruta-bagas were sown or planted upon any of the 
plots in 1874. The experience of the previous years had shown that 
upon the land of this particular field, the ruta-baga crop is not well 
suited for the kind of experiments now in question. The line of 
squares designated EE, Nos. 7, 8,9 (barley and beans), adjoining 
section DD, were likewise thrown out of consideration, because that 
strip of land had been contaminated with dung, as has been explained 
on page 126. 
The same kinds and quantities of fertilizers were applied in 1874 
as in 1873 and in precisely the same places, excepting of course the 
squares that were not to be planted. Compare the remarks on page 
