526
EXPOSITION AT VIENNA.
Although not a member of the hoard of directors of this enterprise, having declined election to this position, the stockholders expressed their thanks to me by giving me a vote at the meetings, according to statute. I had also caused the bat-guano found in the grottos at Altogradena, near Orszowa, to be collected. This reached the amount of 4,900 hundred-weight.
At the same time, I made experiments on a small and large scale with various manures, wishing to discover what amount and kinds, whether alone or mixed together, would produce the greatest yield.
In the following table B, I have collected the results which have proved most satisfactory fronl 138 experiments made in the year 1871, in connection with beet-culture. Here are to be seen per acre the kind, quantity and cost of the manure ; also the amount, value and richness in sugar of the beets.
Experiments conducted on a large scale with various artificial manures in the cultivation of all other products, although applied in very different quantities, and at different times, -were, in general, attended with the most satisfactory results.
They settled the following points :
Stable-manure, produced with farm or purchased straw and fodder, is twice as dear as its equivalent in artificial manure. Further, good manures are more efficient when properly mixed together than when used alone; manuring should be conducted rather frequently, and in small quantities, than seldom, and in large quantities; finally, as with animals a certain quantity of fodder is necessary to sustain life, and only the amount given over and above this serves to produce strength, flesh and fat, so to sustain the productive power of land a certain quantity of manure is absolutely necessary, and only what is added beyond this produces an increased and profitable yield.
This I have proved in the following manner. I selected fj-om my estate at Kolin two superior pieces of land, of equal quality, from those portions which had been held by small tenants for over one hundred years, and had thus become exhausted. They had come into my hands between the years 1863 and 1869, one after another. These I sowed with winter-grain for the harvest of 1868, having given them 5.2