Grasses Fertilized with Nitrogen Compared with Legumes for Hay and Pasture 1

HEN the war ends, some of the products of the synthetic W nitrogen factories may be available for purposes other than munitions. For some time this question has been under study by a joint committee of the American Society of Agronomy, the American Society for Horticultural Science, the Association of Land-Grant Colleges and Universities, the National Fertilizer Association, the Tennessee Valley Authority, and the U. S. Dept. of Agriculture. The general idea appears to be that if nitrogen in fertilizers should be relatively cheaper than before the war, it might be a good policy for farmers to increase their use of this important plant nutrient. For many years, the Agronomy Department of the Storrs, Conn., Agricultural Experiment Station has had hundreds of plots on which the response of grasses to various rates and times of application of nitrogenous fertilizers has been determined. On the same field and during the same seasons, legumes and legume-grass mixtures have been under test. It is the purpose of this paper to present the many data now available on these comparisons. All of the experiments were located a t or near Storrs, on Charlton fine sandy loam soil, which, because of its compact subsoil, retains water relatively well and is therefore one of the best soil types in Connecticut for the growth of grasses. TIMOTHY FOR HAY