The 2 acres of land yielded me 32 1/4 bushels of wheat at $1 per bushel, $32 25 Deduct for average yield of the above, 2 acres, 6 bushels at $1 per bushel, $6 00 Deduct for Cost of 560 lbs. Guano, $12 70 ------- $18 70 ------- $13 55 Add for additional straw, 50 ------- Clear profit, $14.05
Here is a clear profit of $14 upon $12.70 invested, and acknowledged to be applied in the most injudicious manner. It is easy to judge what would have been the profit under different circumstances. In the vicinity of this city where straw sells for $5 per hundred little bundles, instead of a credit of 50 cents it would have been at least half the cost of the guano.
_Henry K. Burgwyn's first trial with guano. Its effect on grass sown with wheat._--The name and farm of this gentleman is so widely known as a successful renovator of miserably poor worn out fields, that we are delighted to have it in our power to have his testimony to our impregnable array of witnesses in favor of the most valuable substance for the improvement of such land, ever given by an overruling power for the benefit of those who ought to be exceedingly thankful for so good a gift. But hear what this writer has to say upon this interesting subject.
"Having about 150 acres of my wheat, this year sown upon last year's corn ground, and the land being rather light and not too rich, I feared lest I should fail with my grass sown on _this_ wheat, because of the two successive cereal crops; I therefore bought guano, mixed it with its bulk of plaster, then added fine charcoal, the same, and to this mixture double the whole bulk of deposit of the Roanoke river, a rich alluvial earth, and sowed the whole broadcast in February and March, and harrowed it in, on the top of the wheat I sowed at the rate of 200 lbs. of guano to the acre; the value of which, no doubt, was doubled by the mixture with the absorbents of the ammonia, which is so exceedingly volatile even when left for a few hours, is easily dissipated by the March winds. On this land, I had sown in October previous, clover, timothy, Kentucky blue grass, and Italian ray grass. My harvest has now been over, three weeks, and I have never had a finer stand of all these, even on our rich bottoms. The ray grass matured its seed, rather sooner than the wheat was two-thirds as tall, and where _very thickly sown_, materially injured the product of the wheat, _I have reaped an increased product from my wheat, amply sufficient to repay my outlay for the guano, plaster, &c., and have my grass as my profit on the investment_; this in turn will shade and improve my land, fatten my stock, increase my crops, and cheer my eye with 'grassy slopes,' in place of 'galled hill sides;' this is profit sufficient for the most greedy if turned to a proper account;--be it remembered, too, this was a light and rather poor soil, but based on a good clay subsoil."