applied to the dry land fields and then only after they are well rotted, the fermentation being carried through at least sixty days, during which the material is turned three times for aeration, the work being done at the home. When used on the rice fields where water is abundant the composts are applied in a less fermented condition.
The best yields of rice in this prefecture are some eighty bushels per acre, and crops of barley may even exceed this, the two crops being grown the same year, the rice following the barley. In most parts of Japan the grain food of the laboring people is about 70 per cent naked barley mixed with 30 per cent of rice, both cooked and used in the same manner. The barley has a lower market value and its use permits a larger share of the rice to be sold as a money crop.
The soils are fertilized for each crop every year and the prescription for barley and rice recommended by the Experiment Station, for growers in this prefecture, is indicated by the following table:
FERTILIZATION FOR NAKED BARLEY. | ||||||||||
Pounds per acre. | ||||||||||
Fertilizers. | N | P | K | |||||||
Manure compost | 6,613 | 33.0 | 7.4 | 33.8 | ||||||
Rape seed cake | 330 | 16.7 | 2.8 | 3.5 | ||||||
Night soil | 4,630 | 26.4 | 2.6 | 10.2 | ||||||
Superphosphate | 132 | .... | 9.9 | .... | ||||||
Sum | 11,705 | 76.1 | 22.7 | 47.5 | ||||||
FERTILIZATION FOR PADDY RICE. | ||||||||||
Manure compost | 5,291 | 26.4 | 5.9 | 27.1 | ||||||
Green manure, soy beans | 3,306 | 19.2 | 1.1 | 19.6 | ||||||
Soy bean cake | 397 | 27.8 | 1.7 | 6.4 | ||||||
Superphosphate | 198 | .... | 12.8 | .... | ||||||
Sum | 9,192 | 73.4 | 21.5 | 53.1 | ||||||
Total for year | 20,897 | 149.5 | 44.2 | 100.6 |
Where these recommendations are followed there is an annual application of fertilizer material which aggregates some ten tons per acre, carrying about 150 pounds of nitrogen, 44 pounds of phosphorus and 100 pounds of potassium. The crop yields which have been associated with