SECRETARY'S REPORT. 77 



the use of ashes, lime, super-phosphates, salt, saltpetre, guano, 

 &G. The base of their composts is meadow mud ; this is dug 

 and exposed to the sun, rains and frost, for several months, and 

 then mingled with the more concentrated manures already 

 mentioned." 



Another intelligent and practical farmer writes : — " Barn and 

 compost manures are chiefly used, and mostly applied to the 

 hills — a practice I am not much in favor of, unless we can plough 

 in a large quantity to sustain the ear in its growth. Some of 

 us top-dress our grass land with compost, applied after harvest- 

 ing. Some of the farmers here bring night manures from the 

 cities and villages, in the cold season, and compost it with mud 

 and other soil, in considerable quantities. Ashes are used on 

 all kinds of soil to advantage. Gypsum is used in the hill for 

 potatoes, some think to advantage; others have a different 

 opinion. Gypsum and lime have proved of very little service, 

 applied to our soil. Mud seems to be the principal ingredient 

 in composting with our stable and privy manures. Leached 

 ashes, clay, and coal dust, are excellent applications for our 

 porous soil. Guano has not reached us yet; the uncertainty 

 of its goodness, ignorance of applying it, and high prices de- 

 manded for it, will prove an obstacle to its introduction here, 

 for some time to come. People differ in their theories about com- 

 posting manure ; some of us compost our manures in low places 

 which receive the wash of the barnyard, or the road, and 

 have an idea that the process of composting requires a great 

 deal of humidity, more than what naturally gets into a barn 

 cellar; others compost in barn cellars, and where swine are 

 kept, and this may be the better way." 



The same writer says that double the quantity of manure 

 might easily be made. 



« 



In the county of Barnstable, also, they use " Barnyard and 

 stable manures, and sea-weed, ploughed in, in the spring, for 

 hoed crops. But little attention paid to composting. One 

 hundred per cent, increase, certainly. I think I should be safe 

 in saying two hundred, by composting sea-weed, muck, and 

 marsh mud ; but few farmers but that have one of these sub- 

 stances handy and in abundance; many farmers have all of 

 them." 



