Bernard Shirley Dyer

“ If we can get at any rate a considerable proportion of our nitrate of soda well incorporated with the soil by the time the bine begins its active and rapid growth, we may be helping to lay the foundation of a good crop better than if we delay the application of the nitrate until those months when the soil is actively producing nitrates from other sources. ”

“ When these conditions were followed by good growing weather and by a most satisfactory scarcity of insect pests, it is after all not remarkable that even nitrogen starved land, like our Plot A, should produce a fine crop of hops, or that our Plot X, with its residues of unutilised dung to supply additional material for nitrification, should have given so excellent an account of itself. ”

“ It is not, of course, to be supposed that any hop-grower would year after year use, as we are using, nothing but phosphates, potash, and nitrate of soda in his hop gardens. Miscellaneous feeding is probably good for plants as well as for animals, and the quantity of nitrate of soda to be used in a system of miscellaneous manuring will obviously depend on the quantity of nitrogen supplied in other forms. ”

“ Now, a ton of hops per acre certainly cannot be grown without a very good supply of nitrogen from somewhere, and, as no nitrogen had been added to the soil since 1895, the natural capital of organic nitrogen in the soil and the residue of the dung applied in 1895 must have been the sources drawn upon, though for two years previously these had sufficed to produce but little more than half a crop. ”

“ Not only, therefore, must there have been an exceptionally large production of soil nitrates, but an unusually large proportion of the nitrates produced must have remained in the surface soil and in the upper subsoil, within reach of the crop of 1899, so that every hop garden, apart from any application of manure in 1899, must have been in the position of having received, by natural agency, an extensive dressing of nitrate. ”

“ But it is wise policy to use phosphates in some form or other every year in every hop garden. They are inexpensive, and without them neither dung, nitrate of soda, ammonia salts, nor organic manures can be expected to produce both a full vigorous growth of bine and well-matured, full-weighted hops. ”

“ We had in 1898 a very hot summer, followed by an unusually warm autumn, affording a long and favourable time for the natural nitrification of the organic nitrogen of the soil, so that the land must have been unusually well supplied with natural nitrates by the time that winter arrived, if, indeed, the term winter can properly be applied to such mild weather as was experienced during the calendar winter months of 1898-99. ”

“ Readers will, of course, bear in mind that, except on Plots X and S no nitrogenous manure other than nitrate of soda has been applied to our experimental plots. Now, as I have already in effect observed, it is neither convenient nor desirable that hops, more than any other crop, should be restricted to one form of manuring. A hop farmer will naturally, and rightly, give his hops as much dung as his farm resources will supply ”

“ In concluding this report I would once again emphasise the necessity, whether dung is used or not, and whatever form of nitrogenous manure is employed, of also using an abundance of phosphates. On soils containing plenty of lime, no better or cheaper phosphatic manure can be used than superphosphate, of which 8 cwt. per acre per annum makes a fair dressing. ”

“ Quantity, however, is far from being the chief consideration in hop-growing, and the first question that any experienced reader will ask is naturally as to the quality of the produce of the various plots. ”

“ The results of modern investigation tend to show that it is very largely to the presence and proportion of the latter that hops owe their preserving value, though the quality of hops is by no means wholly dependent on this one feature. ”

“ We got better results, but nitrate in excess of 2 cwt. per acre did no additional good. Two cwt. of nitrate of soda per acre, in conjunction with phosphates and potash, gave 161⁄2 cwt. of hops per acre, as against 13 cwt. per acre grown on the rest of the field with the aid of dung. In 1897 we also applied our first dressing of nitrate in February, but finished dressing at the end of May. The results were far more satisfactory and progressive. ”

“ There is a large variety of other nitrogenous manures in the market, such as Peruvian and Damaraland guano, sulphate of ammonia, fish guano, dried blood, rape dust, furriers' refuse, horn shavings, hoof-parings, wood dust, shoddy, &c. ”

“ Chapman, "that although there is a marked difference between the extreme members of the above series, the neighbouring samples resemble one another somewhat closely.
"No. 9 is distinctly inferior in every respect. ”