Farm and Garden

King Country Chronicle, Volume IV, Issue 241, 12 March 1910, Page 3

Farm and Garden

FORMS OF NITROGEN. Nitrogen is the most expenisve of the three essential fertilising elements. It exists in three different forms —• organic nitrogen, ammonia, and nitrate. Organic nitrogen exists in combination with other elements either as vegetable or animal matter. All material containing organic nitrogen are valuable in proportion to their rapidity of decay, because change of form must take place before the nitrogen can serve as plant food. Organic nitrogen differs in availability not only accord- ' ing to the kind of material which supplies it, but according to the treatment it receives. The nitrogen in the tables of analysis marked "insoluble in water" is organic nitrogen. Nitrogen as ammonia usually exists in commercial manures in the form of sulphate of ammonia, and is more readily available than organic nitrogen. While nitrogen in the form of ammonia is extremely soluble in water, it is not readily removed from the soil by leachine, as it is held by the organic compounds of the soil. Nitrogen as nitrate exists in com- ■ mercial products chiefly as nitrate of soda. Nitrogen in this form is directly and immediate available, no further changes being necessary. It is completely soluble in water, and diffuses readily throughout the soil. It differs from the ammonia compounds in forming no insoluble compounds with soil constituents, and may be lost by leaching. The "nitrogen soluble in water" of the tables includes both the nitrogen as ammonia and as nitrate. Every farmer should have a few sheep on the farm for household purposes and to keep the weeds down. It never pays to overstock a pasture. It is not possibe to get maximum results where there is not sufficient feed during the whole season. The experience of hundreds of breeders of purebred flocks demonstrates that best results are secured from the mating of matured animals. As new facts are discovered in soil treatment they only serve to prove what has been urged for years, that livestock, tillage, legumes,, and crop rotation will save the land. The question of pasture improvement is well worth the consideration of every farmer who depends upon the grazing season to carry most of his live stock nearly half of the year. Incidentally, by domestication, and generations of breeding, the pig for early maturity and quick fattening, the length of his intestines has been increased, it is claimed by scientists, more than 130 per cent. The relationship which harvest has to stock-keeping is already very close, and it is more than likely that as time goes on the advisability of utilising the arable land and its products more fully will be seen and acted upon. It is not economy to put a machine in the shed before overhauling and attending to the parts which needed replacing so as to be ready for the coming harvest. The old proverb, which said, "A stitch in time saves nine," can be applied nowhere better than on the farm, especially in regard to machinery. Handy farm devices are some of the things we would like to receive from our readers. If you have something on the farm in the way of some litte device that has proved to be a convenience and labour-saver, just make a sketch of it and send it in with brief description. Pigs are the proper side line of the dairyfarmer; but jpigs are sensitive and liable to many of the ills of the flesh. Swine fever costs American farmers £8,000,000 per annum, and an authority has expressed the opinion it would cost £400,00,000 to eradicate it. The effective method of treatment would be the destruction of all the pigs in a district proclaimed infected.