“I propose to do so,” he replied. “Situated as I am, close to a good shipping station, no crop pays me better. My potatoes this year have averaged me over $100 per acre.”
“Very good. But it is perfectly clear to my mind that sooner or later, you must either farm slower or feed higher. And in your case, situated close to a village where you can get plenty of help, and with a good shipping station near by, you had better adopt the latter plan. You must feed higher, and make richer manure. You now feed out 213 tons of stuff, and make 600 loads of manure, worth $912.40. By feeding out one third, or 71 tons more, you can more than double the value of the manure.
| 50 tons of bran or mill-feed would give manure worth | $ 729.50 |
| 21 tons decorticated cotton-seed cake | 585.06 |
| $1,314.56 |
“Buy and feed out this amount of bran and cake, and you would have 800 loads of manure, worth on the land $2,226.96, or, estimating as before that it cost 30 cents a load to handle it, its net value would be $1,986.96.”
I am well aware that comparatively few farmers in this section can afford to adopt this plan of enriching their land. We want better stock. I do not know where I could buy a lot of steers that it would pay to fatten in the winter. Those farmers who raise good grade Shorthorn or Devon cattle are not the men to sell them half-fat at low rates. They can fatten them as well as I can. For some time to come, the farmer who proposes to feed liberally, will have to raise his own stock. He can rarely buy well-bred animals to fatten. A good farmer must be a good farmer throughout. He can not be good in spots. His land must be drained, well-worked, and free from weeds. If he crops heavily he must manure heavily, and to do this he must feed liberally—and he can not afford to feed liberally unless he has good stock.
“I have, myself, no doubt but you are right on this point,” said the Doctor, “but all this takes time. Suppose a farmer becomes satisfied that the manure he makes is not rich enough. To tell him, when he is anxious to raise a good crop of potatoes next year, that he must go to work and improve his stock of cattle, sheep, and swine, and then buy bran and oil-cake to make richer manure, is somewhat tantalizing.”
This is true, and in such a case, instead of adding nitrogen and phosphoric acid to his manure in the shape of bran, oil-cake, etc., he can buy nitrogen and phosphoric acid in guano or in nitrate of soda and superphosphate. This gives him richer manure; which is precisely what he wants for his potatoes. His poor manure is not so much deficient in potash as in nitrogen and phosphoric acid, and consequently it is nitrogen and phosphoric acid that he will probably need to make his soil capable of producing a large crop of potatoes.
I have seen Peruvian guano extensively used on potatoes, and almost always with good effect. My first experience with it in this country, was in 1852. Four acres of potatoes were planted on a two-year-old clover-sod, plowed in the spring. On two acres, Peruvian guano was sown broadcast at the rate of 300 lbs. per acre and harrowed in. The potatoes were planted May 10. On the other two acres no manure of any kind was used, though treated exactly alike in every other respect. The result was as follows: