A NEW FERTILISER

Wairarapa Times-Age, 4 October 1938, Page 3

A NEW FERTILISER

KOTKUR PHOSPHATE ANNOUNCED. An entirely new phosphatic fertiliser is announced in the advertising columns of today’s issue. It is stated that Kotkur Phosphate is quite different in a number of ways from any manure which has been so far available to the New Zealand farmer, but a point which the manufacturers insist upon is that it is not designed to replace superphosphate, which has been proved for a score of years to be entirely suitable and effective for the average conditions of farming in New Zealand. This is a special product designed for a special purpose. Kotkur Phosphate is manufactured in the Otahuhu works of the Challenge Phosphate Company and follows two years of close study and experiment in an endeavour to fulfil a definite need which has long been recognised. Part of this research called for the Company’s Superintendent, Mr W. CassellsBrown, going to America and Europe to investigate the special products being produced in works overseas. Returning to New Zealand he continued his research in the field and laboratory and in the Otahuhu Works in an endeavour to produce a fertiliser primarily suitable for hand top-dressing but one that would also contain phosphate in the desired forms to give both a quick response and lasting effects. The result of his two years of work is found in Kotkur Phosphate, and the works are in full production and immediate .deliveries can be given. The chief use for which Kotkur has been designed is top-dressing on hill country; its texture is completely gran-, ular and no fertiliser yet produced is so eminently suited for hand-sowing, and yet it will readily flow through a top-dresscr. The other special purposes for Kotkur are peat and peaty soils and heavy clay soils, the types which give up moisture very slowly and lie cold during’ the winter and early spring. Kotkur contains 54/56 phosphates, of which three-fifths is water-soluble, the remaining twofifths being slowly available, an ideal type of manure where top-dressing cannot be applied frequently.