Sugar Factory Lime for Fertilizing.

Is the lime from a sugar factory a good fertilizer for either oranges or walnuts; if so, about what amount to the acre would you recommend?

If your land needs lime or if it is heavy and needs to be more friable, or if you have reason to think that it may be soured by exclusion of air or by excessive use of fermenting manures, the refuse lime you speak of will do as a corrective just as other lime does, though, perhaps, not so actively.  Beyond that there is nothing of great value in it.  You can use two or three applications of 500 pounds to the acre without overdoing it - if your land needs it at all.

Nitrate With Stable Manure.

I am going to plant about 2000 plants of rhubarb.  I intend to put some cow and horse manure under the plants as a fertilizer, but I do not think I will have enough for all the plants, so I bought some nitrate of lime, with the intention of mixing the cow and horse manure with the lime nitrate, which I thought would allow me to spread the manure much thinner and I could cover more surface.  Now I am not sure but the nitrate of lime will burn the manure if mixed with it.

You can mix either nitrate of lime or nitrate of soda with the stable manure as you propose; in fact, it is frequently done.  These nitrates are neutral salts and do not act on manure as caustic lime or wood ashes would do.  They are quite content to keep along without kicking their neighbors.  But, of course, the more nitrate you add the more careful you must be about using too much of the mixture, and as for putting manure under any plant, at spring planting particular, it is dangerous business.

Nitrate of Soda.

How shall I apply nitrate of soda as fertilizer for roses and other flowers and lawns during the summer months?

One has to be very careful in the use of nitrate of soda not to use too much and not to apply it unevenly, so that too much is brought in contact with the roots of particular plants.  From one to two hundred pounds an acre evenly distributed is the usual prescription for nitrate of soda, although in the case of bearing orange trees considerably larger amounts have been successfully used.  This would be at the rate of about one ounce to one square yard of surface.  It would be a safe application to begin with and could be increased a little on the basis of observation of results.  Of course, the application should be accompanied by copious irrigation in order to dissolve and distribute the substance.

Fertilizing Strawberries.

I have half an acre of strawberries which will fruit their second season this spring, and half an acre set last month.  I had intended to use nitrate of soda on them, but was talking to a friend who told me it would kill my soil.  That the first year it would produce an enormous crop and the next year I couldn’t raise anything.  Which would be better to use here, stable manure or commercial fertilizer?