Essays in Natural History and AgricultureGarnett, Thomas
Science
Essays in Natural History and Agriculture
Garnett, Thomas
Agriculture; Salmon; Zoology
in due proportion to each other, and I also wished to ascertain
whether wheat and oats would thrive equally well with the same
sort of manuring. I accordingly limed the land soon after the
wheat came up, and in March I applied silicate of soda, sulphate
of magnesia, gypsum, common salt, and nitrate of soda. A fortnight
after this I applied guano, then bones dissolved in sulphuric
acid, then woollen rags dissolved in potash (the two latter in
weak solution); and the consequence was, that I don't think there
was a single grain in the whole parcel--at least I could not find
one--the straw was no great length, and the blade much discolored
with mildew, whilst the oats were seven feet high, and with straws
through which I could blow a pea, and large panicles, although
the oat was not particularly well-fed. The inference I have drawn
from these experiments is, that as far as is practicable the
manuring should be adapted to the temperature, but as this is
obviously impossible in a climate like ours, the only way is to
rather under than over manure, and to apply no ammoniacal manure
to the wheat crop, or at all events very little; for although
guano was beneficial to wheat when used in conjunction with
silicates, &c. &c. in 1844, yet the injury it did in 1845 may very
fairly be set against that benefit. I should feel obliged if any
of your readers who may have tried the experiment of manuring
grain crops with guano, the last season (1845) would publish the
result as compared with a similar crop without such manuring. I
feel convinced that such result would be against the use of guano
for wheat in 1845. I am the more confirmed in the opinion that
ammoniacal manures are unfavourable for wheat, by a series of
articles in the "Gardener's Chronicle" on the "Geo-Agriculture of
Middlesex," in which the writer states that land in that county
which in Queen Elizabeth's time produced such good wheat that it
was reserved for her especial use, will now scarcely grow wheat at
all, and when that grain is sowed upon it, the straw is always
mildewed, and the sample very poor; and this is attributed--and no
doubt justly so--to the extensive use of London manure. My crop
was only 32 bushels to the acre of 60 lbs. to the bushel; last
year the crop, as I have said before, was 50 bushels of the same
weight.
* * * * *
_To the same._
CLITHEROE, _7th March_, 1848.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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