336 NATURE SEPTEMBER 9, 1944, VoL. 154 Manganese-deficient Soils that manganese-deficient soils can be identified by this method. IN 1942, Sherman, McHargue and Hodgkiss1 2 A survey of soils is of course necessary to establish described a modification of Leepez 's method which this method, but should it prove to give results con• would identify: (a) manganese-deficient neutral and sistent .with those of Sherman, McHargue and alkaline soils; (b) strongly acid soils that will become Hodgkiss and those mentioned here, the method manganese-deficient when limed to near neutrality ; would cartainly prove to be useful in advisory work. and (c) soils that are likely to contain such excessive E. s. TWYMAN. quantities of available manganese as to be toxic to Botanical Department, plants. There is evidence from analyses of English The University, soils that their method may be useful at any rate in Birmingham. identifying the first two classes of soils. Aug. 3. The method described by the above-mentioned 1 Sherman, McHargue and Hodgkiss, Soil &i., M, 253 (11HZ}. authors was slightly modified to ensure easy manipula• 1 Leeper, Proc. Roy. Soc. Victoria, f7 (ll), 225 (1935). tion and to save time by the use of separate 20-gm. samples of air-dried soil for the three extractions, namely: (1) water-soluble manganese, (2) exchange• able manganese, and (3) easily reducible manganese. Science and the Fisheries This procedure was adopted instead of the single THis is truly a subject for the jortnidable specula• sample used successively for the three extractions. tion with which Prof. .James Ritchie has treated itl. It will be seen from the results that the small quan• He dreams of a mountainous, nay astronomical, dash tities of water-soluble and exchangeable manganese of nutrient chemicals in the North Sea, which is to in the extract containing the easily reducible man• make a remarkable increase in the growth of fish. ganese made no difference to the general conclusions. And why not? Greater changes than that have been The three samples were then shaken for one hour made on the face of the earth in the past ; but in a rotary shaker with 150 mi. of extracting agents, scarcely so simply--except in destruction. The that is, distilled water, neutral ammonium acetate, southern, shallower part of the North Sea, where the and 0·2 per cent solution of hydroquinone in neutral main nurseries are, has been found to suffer from ammonium acetate. The procedure as described by shortage of phosphate in one or two dry years, and the authors was then followed. there was no shortage in one or two normal years. Three types of soil were investigated: Sun and warmth are likely limiting factors. In the ( 1) A light, black, heath soil from Shropshire with meantime, transplantation has been successful in a strongly acid reaction under natural conditions. increasing fish-growth, on an experimental scale in (2) A heavy Lias clay from south Warwickshire the North Sea, and on a commercial scale in the with an almost neutral reaction. Belt Seas. The rosy picture given of the United States as the ( 3) A garden loam from the grolinds of the Univer• land of the free, in freshwater fishery matters, does sity of Birmingham with a pH above 7 ·0. not now apply to salmon fisheries, nor I think to Manganese-deficient oats were seen growing on many other fisheries of a commercial scale. I dislike the first two soils while healthy oats were growing the word 'restriction': 'modera tion' is a better one, on the University soils. The Shropshire soils had pH and is part of the practice of husbandry. values between 6 ·4 and 7 ·9 due to heavy liming, and MICHAEL G:RAHA.M. certainly fall into the category manganese-deficient British Liberation Army. when heavily limed. The Lias soil from Warwickshire Aug. 19. had pH values between 6·3 and 7·0 and is therefore 1 Naturs,l.IS4, 275 (1944). an almost neutral soil. The high pH of the University soil was due to heavy liming. A New - from Wales MANGANESE IN P.P.M. OF AIR·DRIED SOIL DR. A. W. GROVES recently sent to one of us a Source pH Water Exchange- Easily specimen of white vein-material found in the man• soluble able reducible ganese ore from the Benallt mine near Rhiw, Carnar• Shropshire 1 6·7 1·2 1·1 8·2 vonshire. He suspected the presence of the rare 2 6·4 0 ·0 1·5 5·7 " 3 7·9 0·0 0 ·8 5·3 barium- celsian and paracelsian, which were " 4 0·5 0 ·8 2·8 discovered in the same mine in 1911 1,2. We found " - Warwickshire 1 6·5 0 ·0 4·7 38 ·1 the optical properties of the differed from 2 6·3 O·O 1 ·3 25·6 those of any known barium mineral, and micro• " 3 7·0 12·3 43·7 " - chemical analysis. bas now shQwn that it is a new University 1 7·5 0·0 2·7 183·0 barium-feldspar and the first example of an alumino• 2 7·7 0·5 2 ·1 120·0 silicate of barium containing as the dominant " 3 - 1·5 8 ·9 98·2 " 4 - 1·1 9 ·3 113·7 alkali. The name proposed for the new mineral is " 5 0·8 10·5 150·0 " - 'banalsite', suggested by its .chemical formula BaNa2Al,Si,Ow . It is seen from the accompanying table that the X-ray photographs show that banalsite is ortho• easily reducible manganese is the important fraction rhombic with unit-cell dimensions a 8·50, b 9·97, in identifying manganese-deficient soils. The Shrop• c 16·73 A. Iba or Ibam; the shire soil had an easily reducible manganese of less observed specrfic gravity IS d = 3 ·06, whence the unit than 10 p.p.m., the neutral Lias clay had less than cell contents are calculated to be 4BaNa 2Al,Si,Ow 50 p .p.m. manganese, while the University soil samples No crystal forms are visible on hand specimens, but all had about or well over 100 p.p.m . of manganese. thin sections reveal indicationS of a few faces of There is, therefore, further evidence here supporting simple indexes including (110) and (001) both par• the conclusion of Sherman, McHargue and Hodgkiss allel to good directions. The optic axial

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