60 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



located by, or near the flow of salt wator, make great use of muscles, salt 

 marsh mud, sea weed with fresh mud. Keep up a rotation of crops, and cul- 

 tivate thoroughly." 



Joseph Frost, Elliot. 



This matter of manures is one of the greatest importance to 

 every farmer, -whatever be the condition of his hands : if they are 

 fertile and productive as could be desired, he needs them not less to 

 maintain fertility and so to be able to transmit to his children an 

 unexhausted soil. If his lands be already exhausted, he is in more 

 immediate and urgent need of such a supply of the elements of fer- 

 tility as shall, at least, restore it to pristine productiveness, if not to 

 improve it beyond its original condition. In the report of last year, 

 considerable attention was given to this topic, but it is one which is 

 in no danger of being soon exhausted, and one concerning which 

 line upon line and precept upon precept is as needful as for any 

 which claims the farmer's attention, and it is also true, that what- 

 ever else may be attempted or left undone, in the way of renova- 

 tion, little can be accomplished unless accompanied with diligent 

 heed to save, to preserve, and rightly to prejtarc and use all the 

 fertilizing materials at his command. It was there shown to be 

 the opinion of many of our best farmers that not less than one-half 

 of the means of fertilization at present within the reach of the 

 farmers of Maine, is now lost or wasted for -want of reasonable dili- 

 gence to preserve them, and that if this great loss could be arrested 

 and the whole employed in the best manner, it Avould cause a most 

 astonishing change to come over the face of the State, and millions 

 of dollars to be annually added to its wealth. 



Whether this loss is to be attributed to ignorance of, its true value, 

 or to a reckless disregard of it, an immediate stop ought to be put 

 to such practice. Every farmer should at once see to it, that so far 

 as his own premises are concerned, this reproach upon our agricul- 

 ture be wiped off. 



On no one point is there greater mal-practice than in allo^Ying 

 the liquid excretions of animals to run to Avaste, and this probably 

 in many cases, if not most, may be owing to ignorance of their 

 value compared with that of the solid ; not every one is aware that 

 it is not merely of equal, but of greater value — not that we could 

 afford to dispense with either, but if compelled to do so, we could 



