THE OMAHA SUNDAY BEE
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OMAHA SIOUX FALLS
THE "JOHN DEERE" LOW DOWN STEEL FRAME MANURE SPREADER
No Clutches THE SPREADER WITH THE BEATER ON THE AXLE Roller Bearings
No Chains ALL DRIVING PARTS ON THE MAIN AXLE Light Draft
No Adjustments Only 36 Inches From Ground to Top of Box Easy to Load
What Manure Will Do for You
By Dr. W. E. Taylor, Soil Culture Department, Deere & Co.
Do you know what the value of manure
from live stock in the United States amounts
to each year? Do you know that it amounts
to more than two and one-quarter billions
of dollars and that more Is wasted in value
than the taxes of all the farms in the United
States?
Manure is just as essential to the life and
growth of plants as broad, meat and pota
toes are to you,, or corn, oats and hay are
to live stock.
Manure contains the essenee of fertility
of the soil. Take it away from your land
and you rob it of Its food. You disorgan
ize its physical body and the crop pays the
penalty.
Manure contains nitrogen, phosphorus
and potash. These are the essential ele
ments that enter into plant food compounds
and they have a greater value thaa the
same elements in commercial form, for
the reason that they carry with them
organic matter undergoing the process of
formation into humus, a substance neces
sary to make available the plant food ele
ments. Why use a manure spreader? Let me
ask you a question: Why does a cook dis
tribute seasoning into the food and then
thoroughly work it evenly throughout the
mass until every particle of the food is sea
soned? If a cook should carelessly throw
a handful of rock salt into a kettle of por
ridge, would the seasoning be properly dis
tributed and would the porridge be palat
able? For the same reason the farmer
should evenly distribute the manure over
his land, a top dressing being preferable,
apd then, by using a disc, work it into the
seed-bed until the distribution la thorough.
By this means the plant food and tie or
ganic matter comes into contact with all
the particles of soil, and it must be remem
bered that the food-gathering roots secure
their nourishment from a coating which,
forms around each particle of soil contain
ing moisture and plant food.
If the manure Is carelessly spread by
hand, it is left in lumps. One place has too
much, another not enough, and often it does
more harm than good.
If manure is carelessly spread and plowed
under in bunches, the bunches form air
spaces at the bottom of the furrow, pre
venting a compact contact, thereby prevent
ing capillary attraction. In such cases, much
of the essence of the manure leaches into
the deeper subsoils and is lost, and because
of the insulation preventing capillary at
traction, the seed-bed dries out and the crop
perishes.
If the hianure is evenly spread and thor
oughly disced into the seed-bed, the plant
not only procures food contained in the
manure, but because of the even distribu
tion of the organic matter, the soil is warm,
mellow, and readily receives and retains
moisture.
It has been repeatedly demonstrated that
if manure is used as a top dressing on a
plowed field, that the crop is increased 25
to 30 per cent.
Repeated trials extending over a series
of years has demonstrated the fact that a
manure spreader used on 40 acres of land
will more than pay the cost of the machine
by increasing the crop, to say nothing of the
great saving of labor.
The experiments of Mr. Chesney Hatch,
of Newton eounty, Indiana, are strictly in
keeping with hundreds of other like trials.
Mr. Hatch experimented by spreading ma
nure on 20 acres and at the same time com
pared the results with crops raised on similar
land without manure. I give herewith the
results of his experiments, which should
cause the farmer to seriously consider the
great value of the manure .spreader.
MANURE SPREAD WITH A SPREADER.
Kind of No. of Time Amount Value of V'ru0epof
Grain Acres Planted Harvat'd per Acre Crop per Acre
Corn 10 May 5 620 Bu. 6 $248 00 $24 80
OaU... 10 Apr. 6 560 Bu. 5 1 56 80 15 68
Clover. 10 Apr. 6 30 Toni 4 125 00 12 SO
MANURE SPREAD BY HAND.
Corn.. 10 May 4 I 500 Bu. 5 $200 00 $20 00
Oats... 10 Apr. 6 420 Bu. 5 117 60 11 67
Clover. 10 Apr. 6 21 Tons 4 105 00 10 50
CROP RAISED WITHOUT MANURE.
Corn.. 5 May 6 200 Bu. Nono $80 00 $16 00
Oats... 6 Apr. 9 190 Bu. " 53 20 10 64
Clover. 6 Apr. 9 7 J Tons 37 50 7 60
The manure spreader secures a gain over
the hand spreader in the corn crop of $4.80
ter acre, or $192.00 on forty acres. In oats
the spreder has a credit of $4.01 per acre
over the hand spreader, or $160.40 on forty
acres. In clover, the gain was $2.00 per
acre. The gain made in all the crops where
the spreader was used over land where no
manure was applied was so marked that a
farmer cannot be without one. In fact,
spreading manure with a hand fork is as
crude and unprofitable as the old cradle
would be at this age as a harvesting machine.
The writer has carried on for a number of f
years experiments which have demon
strated tnat wnere manure is used as $a'
a top dressing, evenly spread with j&p
a luauuiue, gives an increase or .y'
ffnm I II trt 1 K now nnnf mmw A. t'
. vu w Ml X U LTG bCUi VTC1 ."ff W f
after the manure was ap- AfAjy
plied with a spreader, A 4 S
and double the '
crease if spread
with a hand J'JkJ?
fork beforeVW
plowing. 4
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