Mr. BIDDLE. I think the whole purpose of Curtis' applications are to use the lower-grade muck, that is the point of the whole thing. Mr. BRAND. Well, I think that that is true, and that is a good point, but there is where I do come in to criticize a little; I say that it is not necessary; they have done good enough work there, and Curtis is able, and Miller is able, and Junkins is able, and Copson is able-able men, every blessed one, and I know that they are not abler than the chemists we have in our own industry, but they are able men, and they have the same training, and some were hired from the same agencies, from prior employment, and things of that sort, so that they are good men, and we don't want to criticize them, but it isn't necessary to claim that you have done something so revolutionary, because it just isn't in the wood.

Mr. BIDDLE. Now, to be fair to Dr. Curtis, he never claimed that he had done anything revolutionary with the patents, but he says that his patents permit him to use a much lower grade of fertilizer and to be able to manufacture a much higher content, and distribute it more cheaply, and that with the educational work of T. V. A., is teaching the farmers to use these highly concentrated phosphates.

Mr. BRAND. That is my point, except for the calcium phosphate, they manufacture exactly the same percentage as the private industry does, and they have to distribute it through the same agencies, except where they get the county agents to do it for nothing.

Mr. BIDDLE. You mix yours, and they send theirs out raw?

Mr. BRAND. We sell a large quantity; and I wish that I could give you the figure of independent sale of superphosphate-Mr. Smalley, can you give me the figure?

MR. SMALLEY. About 800,000 or 900,000 tons of normal superphosphate is sold as such.

Mr. BIDDLE. What content has that?

Mr. BRAND. That ranges from 16 to 20 percent; and we average about 18 percent.

Mr. BIDDLE. But Curtis' is around 45 percent.

Mr. BRAND. I know it; but he has got to add 3 tons of lime in order to get the same results.

Mr. BIDDLE. The farmer adds that when he mixes it on the farm. Mr. BRAND. He has to pay for hauling that lime and he has to mix it, and all of that sort of thing.

Mr. BIDDLE. He doesn't pay for hauling the mixture; he pays for hauling the 45 percent.

Mr. BRAND. By the time he hauls 3 tons of lime, in addition, he hasn't gained so very much. The cost-and I am sure that Dr. Curtis would say the same thing the cost rather favors, if you eliminate transportation, the cost rather favors

Mr. BIDDLE. Can you eliminate transportation?

Mr. BRAND. I am not trying to eliminate it. I would say that if we were to take the whole production, the whole consumption of superphosphate, of the United States, and prepare it, on the basis, for instance, of a triple superphosphate plant in the Idaho field, which has been so much discussed, the cost would be approximately $700,000,000, whereas it is about $400,000,000, including the trans

portation complex, if we use normal superphosphate, because of the convenience of the location of the plants, and because of the fact that phosphate rock itself is a concentrated carrier, and because sulphur, which is used for making sulphuric acid to treat phosphate rock, is also a concentrated character, 1 ton of sulphur, makes 5 tons of sulphuric acid, suitable to treat phosphate rock.

The content of phosphate rock ranges from 25 to 40 percent, roughly.

Acting Chairman SCHWARTZ. Couldn't you move that Idaho plant over into Wyoming without straining a point?

Mr. BRAND. I am glad that you asked that point, for this reason; so much has been said about the deficiency, or the danger of deficiency and running out of our phosphate supplies. There is in your State an equal area to that located in Idaho, that the Geological Survey began to explore this summer, and there is no reason to think that nature in depositing these layers of phosphate ignored Wyoming. It is probable that 5,000,000,000 tons that are located in Idaho will be duplicated in Wyoming, because the area where the phosphate occurs is roughly an area 200 miles wide, and 500 miles from north to south, so that there is no reason to think that there isn't at least double what is presently stated as being the reserve in the Intermountain States. Mr. BIDDLE. Commercially, can you manufacture phosphate in Idaho and transport it to and sell it in Tennessee?

Mr. BRAND. No, sir.

Mr. BIDDLE. That is right.

Mr. BRAND. It is too far away.

Mr. BIDDLE. That is the thing that we have to get at, isn't it? Mr. BRAND. And you can't do that competitively with concentrated superphosphate, which you call triple superphosphate.

Mr. BIDDLE. That is the question; if you can cut by 75 percent the weight of your bag, it is going to make some difference in those transportation costs, isn't it?

Mr. BRAND. But you still have the 3 tons of lime which good agronomy requires to be used.

Mr. BIDDLE. You can get your lime around the country; it is all around the country.

Mr. BRAND. No; there, again, we think of it being ubiquitous, but it has to be transported.

Mr. BIDDLE. It is certainly more ubiquitous than phosphate.
Mr. BRAND. Unquestionably; yes.

Mr. BIDDLE. All right.

Mr. BRAND. Not all of them are good agricultural limes, that is why you have to bring it from the quarries that give you good agricultural lime.

Well, now, on the wet process, that was invented in 1891, by H. H. Wing, patent No. 452,891.

Mr. BIDDLE. You needn't refer to the patent numbers unless you insist on it, because we will take your word for it.

Mr. BRAND. I hope that this record will be used in the future and I hope to have copies of it, and I want to use it, and it is so easy to get a number in and then you have it somewhere.

The first commercial manufacture that we know of was by the Virginia-Carolina Chemical Co., now the Virginia Carolina Chemical Corporation, in 1907, and they have continued to produce it from that day to this.

And I remember back in 1927 or 1928 when Judge Wilson told me that they had had 2,500 tons on hand, in their Charlestown, S. C., plant, for several years, because there wasn't sufficient demand to move it, although they carried it in their schedules for sale regularly. In 1920 the Anaconda Copper Mining Co., beginning first, because of the necessity of disposal of fumes, getting interested first, which is now no longer in the picture, because they now get their sulphuric acid from the treatment of their sulphide ores, and the problem of taking care of the fumes is no longer a serious problem, but they built a concentrated wet process plant at Anaconda, which has a capacity of between 40,000 and 50,000 tons, roughly. The total consumption in the four Intermountain States, adjacent to Montana, is only about 10,000 tons a year, so that it has to be shipped even as far east as Ohio, and the Anaconda Co. has with great labor since 1921 built up a sufficient demand so that this year they hope that they will be able to sell their commodity, and it has taken all of those years.

Mr. BIDDLE. That is on transportation costs.

Mr. BRAND. Largely on transportation costs; their process is very efficient. They get about 1,400 pounds of concentrated superphosphate per ton of rock. They would be naturally, because of their mining experience, and their treatment of other ores, and copper, and smelting generally, efficient in this kind of an operation, and they are, as they are in their mining operation, which is a very difficult operation and very different from the mining in Tennessee, and Florida, but which this committee would not be particularly interested in. I must go on to some other points.

The question of whether the fertilizer industry is able and willing to furnish at reasonable prices, the superphosphate requirement of the American farmer, roughly 2,250,000 farmers use fertilizers of one kind and another. As Mr. Smalley has said, 800,000 tons of that is in the form of superphosphate, per se. The rest of it is very largely, though not wholly, in mixtures.

For instance, we have a considerable use of nitrate of soda, as top dressing, alone, without mixing, and so that there are a few other things, some slight amount of potash used alone.

TYPES OF MIXED FERTILIZERS

Mr. BIDDLE. Let us get some idea of these grades. How many grades are sold of mixed fertilizers?

Mr. BRAND. At the time of our last survey, nearly a thousand grades were sold.

Mr. BIDDLE. A thousand different kinds of grades, are sold to the farmers?

Mr. BRAND. That is right.

Mr. BIDDLE. Let us get some of the most popular of the grades; there is 3-8-3, is that one of the most popular?

Mr. BRAND. Yes; 3-8-3 in the South is one of the most popular, and 5-8-7

Mr. BIDDLE. We are not off 3-8-3 yet.

Mr. BRAND. Yes; that is right.

Mr. BIDDLE. That is, a very large proportion of the Southern market, it goes into 3-8-3?

Mr. BRAND. That goes largely into tobacco, and cotton goods, because tobacco particularly has been found to benefit most by a rather low plant food content fertilizer.

Mr. BIDDLE. Let us get back to 3-8-3. The "3" means what?
Mr. BRAND. Three percent of nitrogen.

Mr. BIDDLE. Out of 100?

Mr. BRAND. One percent is 20 pounds.

Mr. BIDDLE. It is 3 percent out of the 100 percent of nitrogen? Mr. BRAND. That is right.

Mr. BIDDLE. And 8 percent is 8 percent of phosphate, and what is the other 3 percent?

Mr. BRAND. That is potash in terms of K2O.

Mr. BIDDLE. So that that is 14 percent out of these plant-building fertilizers, out of the 100 percent.

Mr. BRAND. That is right.

Mr. BIDDLE. What is the rest made up of?

Mr. BRAND. To begin with, superphosphate contains about 50 percent of calcium compounds, in the natural state, just like milk has lots of water in it, so it is true of the nitrogen carriers, for instance, sulphate of ammonia has about 20 percent of nitrogen, and the rest is the material with which the nitrogen is combined, in the particular compound. These are not sophistications, if that is what you mean.

Mr. BIDDLE. These are not sophistications?

Mr. BRAND. No.

Mr. BIDDLE. Then that 8 percent potash, or phosphate, is that percentage comparable to the 45 percent of Dr. Curtis, with respect to phosphate, is that right?

Mr. BRAND. Yes. Well, that is the percentage in mixed fertilizer, made of the usual 18 percent goods, and the average run of the mill now is from 17 to 18 percent.

Mr. BIDDLE. Isn't that 3-8-3 about 50 percent of all of the mixed fertilizers sold in the South?

Mr. BRAND. In the State of North Carolina, I didn't bring the figures along, but it runs close to that. It varies in the different States, and whether they are growing tobacco or what crops they are growing.

If you get into a potato section, like Aroostook, Maine, their favorite grade is 5-8-7.

Mr. BIDDLE. Now, 5-8-7 is the same basis?

Mr. BRAND. The identical basis.

Mr. BIDDLE. All of these are on the same basis?

Mr. BRAND. They all describe the fertilizer, the first is nitrogen, and the second is phosphate, and the third potash, and those numerals indicate the percentage or the number of units which is 20 pounds each, that is contained in that particular grade.

Mr. BIDDLE. The 3-8-3, of which such a large percentage is sold, particularly in the South for cotton and tobacco, has the effect of increasing the productivity of the land to have more cotton and more tobacco in the land.

Mr. BRAND. And better quality, particularly in the case of tobacco. Mr. BIDDLE. Better quality?

Mr. BRAND. Yes. And you also must use a particular kind of potash in it so far as that is concerned.

Mr. BIDDLE. And each year, assuming that you do not rotate, the utility or the ultimate fertility of the land decreases as you force more out of the fertility in cotton and tobacco?

Mr. BRAND. Well, 3-8-3, with the proper amount applied per acre, does not reduce the fertility level.

Mr. BIDDLE. Then if there is this enormous use of fertilizer in the South, in tobacco and cotton lands, how do you explain the fact, that the Southern States are less fertile, and continually the soil in the South is getting less fertile?

Mr. BRAND. Because geologically they haven't been as rich as the prairie soils; they never were as rich.

Mr. BIDDLE. Aren't they poorer each year?

Mr. BRAND. Those that are not fertilized certainly are, undoubtedly.

Mr. BIDDLE. Isn't it true that those that are fertilized will get a better quality, and a larger crop of tobacco and corn, but that gradually the fertility of the soil is being used up?

Mr. BRAND. If you use the potash alone, or nitrogen alone, or phosphate alone, you depreciate the supply of the other two, as the case may be.

Mr. BIDDLE. I am speaking of 3-8-3.

Mr. BRAND. Then, if you use an adequate application, you do not lower the fertility level. It is merely a question of the poundage of the application, and we are trying, naturally being businessmen, to get them to increase that application, because the experiment station, and the colleges have been telling them for years, particularly in the 3-8-3 territory, that they should apply at least twice as much as they are applying per acre.

Mr. BIDDLE. Do you think that they are telling them different formulas?

Mr. BRAND NO; 3-8-3 is the one that is particularly recommended by the committee of agronomists and has been for years, and we have been trying to get them to recommend 4-8-4, and build it up, but even as recently as 3 weeks ago a conference again recommended a relatively low analysis although we thought that we should have gone up.

Mr. BIDDLE. I thought the use of phosphate was recommended in the South in much more highly concentrated form than that formula would indicate?

Mr. BRAND. Well, that is purely a matter of the rate of application per acre. The ratio within a grade is based upon the metabolic processes of the crop, and they are generally adjusted roughly, just like 5-8-7 has proven over many years to be useful for potatoes, so 3-8-3 has been proven to be useful for tobacco, but we say that if you will increase the amount per acre, and keep the same ratio, you will be doing better, and you will save money on transportation costs, and so forth and so forth, but it is pretty hard to get the farmer to change his practices, we have been working at that now for, since 1911, and