THE FARMER'S MAGAZINE 



101 



and weighed on the 11th of December last, 

 as follows : — 



Guano and manure— tons. 



Green top white 27 



Purple top 21 



Manning and manure — 



Green top 27 



Purple top 19 



Money value of each of the manures, £1 63. 3d, 



Mr. Robert Scot Skirving, Campton ; Mr. Durie, Standing- 

 stane; Mr. Cunningham, guauo merchant, Edinburgh, and 

 other members, took part in the discussion ; and a committee, 

 consisting of Mr. George Hope, Mr. Sydserff, Ruchlaw ; Mr 

 Robert Scott Skirving, Mr. Samuel Sheriff, and Mr. David 

 Sheriff, was appointed to frame rules for members conducting 

 experiments in raising turnips with the different manures — 

 the results to be reported to the meeting of the Club in 

 January, 1859. — North British Agriculturist. 



MANURE WITHIN REACH OF THE FARMER. 



Sir, — " Let nothing be lost," was the command of 

 our divine Lord and Master to his disciples many cen- 

 turies ago ; and although, since these ages have 

 elapsed, laws have altered and customs changed, the 

 force of the axiom still remains unimpaired, and whe- 

 ther with reference to the warnings we may receive, the 

 opportunities afforded us, or the advantages placed 

 within our reach, it forms the basis of all success and 

 prosperity in every undertaking : " h^tnothinghtlosi." 

 In applying this maxim to the collecting of manure, it 

 rniuht not be out of place to bear in mind the Scotch 

 adage, " A stone is the only mote in a muck-heap"; 

 but a more extended knowledge of things has taught us 

 that what have long been considered stones are even to 

 be made valuable as a manure. Almost every thing, 

 therefore, is worthy of our attention in this respect, and 

 is in some way or other to be rendered available in 

 aiding fertilization. 



In days when agriculture was much more imperfectly 

 understood than at present, great carelessness was ex- 

 hibited with regard to manure. Much valuable material 

 was burnt, liquid manure allowed to run waste, and 

 even the excrements of the stock with the straw lay 

 exposed to evaporation, under a burning sun, and to 

 waste by fermentation. I would be glad if in our day, 

 and under the authority of an enlightened state of 

 agriculture, no such abuses existed. But alas ! I am 

 sorry to be forced to acknowledge that men with their 

 eyes open should still be equally neglectful of these 

 important elements of successful agriculture, annually 

 spending large sums upon artificial manures (many of 

 which are altogether useless), and neglecting to take 

 advantage of those valuable fertilizers produced upon 

 their own farms, which require only care, attention, 

 and a small outlay, to be rendered available. 



The soil is to be considered as the great store-house, 

 t.) contain the food of plants, and the medium operated 

 upon by air, water, and heat, which, by their various 

 actions upon the soil and the manure which it contains, 

 transforms certain of their constituents into such a 

 soluble and gaseous state as to be absorbed by the 

 spongioles of the roots, and enter into the organization 

 of the plant ; so that it is by the application of the 

 proper manures to the proper crop, and in such quan- 

 tities as to meet the requirements of the soil, that the 

 result in the crop, in ordinary cases, is to be attributed 

 to the different descriptions of soil affecting this more 

 particularly by their tendency to retain moisture or the 

 contrary, their liability to become over-saturated, their 

 power of attracting heat, or their readiness to become 

 impregnated witli those gases assimilated by the plants ; 

 so that the value of soils is not entirely dependent upon 

 the amount of the food of plants which they naturally 

 contain, but by the manner in which they (according to 

 their nature) allow the food supplied in the manure to 

 be assimilated by the plants, and yield to them the 

 greatest benefit of which it is capable. 



Having thus briefly adverted to the action of manure 

 in the soil and its assimilation by plants, with the view 



of illustrating how necessary it is for every farmer to 

 bestow the greatest attention upon the care and manage- 

 ment of his manures, let me now turn more particularly 

 to the object of my letter ; and first reflect upon 

 that custom so prevalent in all parts of the 

 country of burning couch-grass and all vege- 

 table rubbish collected upon the farm, a practice 

 which I consider most wasteful and impolitic. By 

 analysis we learn that throughout the vegetable kingdom 

 there exists a great similarity in the constitution of 

 plants, their components being almost the same, but 

 existing in different proportions in different kinds of 

 plants ; surely, then, it is reasonable to conclude that 

 there must be contained in all vegetable matter much 

 that is valuable as the food of plants, and requiring 

 only to be brought into such a condition as to be assimi- 

 lated by them. No doubt combustion is a sure means 

 of destroying the vitality of all seeds and weeds of every 

 description ; but it is an equally certain mode of dissipa- 

 ting mucilaginous, gelatinous, saccharine, oily, and extrac- 

 tive fluids, which along with solution of carbonic acid and 

 water are substances, which in their unchanged state 

 contain almost all the principles necessary for the life of 

 plants. The substances, therefore, which principally 

 compose vegetable matter are dissipated by the action of 

 fire ; and thus, by the loss of those very ingredients 

 which constitute their chief value as a manure, they be- 

 come reduced to a mere fraction of their original bulk. 



Upon retentive soils, burnt earth or calcined clay may 

 have a very good effect ; but in this case their action 

 (particularly the latter) is almost entirely mechanical, 

 by disintegrating the soil — their value as a manure con- 

 sisting chiefly in the amount of carbon, and its power of 

 absorbing ammonia from the atmosphere. Paring and 

 burning, although perhaps judicious in reclaiming certain 

 lands in which all kinds of troublesome seeds, roots, grubs, 

 and larvae of insects abound, still in very many instances 

 in which it is adopted it must be pronounced a wasteful 

 practice ; but whilst benefit may result from the applica- 

 tion of fire in the instances above-mentioned, we know of 

 no pretext whatever, beyond that of custom, for the burn- 

 ing of couch-grass and other vegetable refuse. Experi- 

 ments have proved that the ashes of burnt straw are i:n 

 excellent manure, but who would think of con- 

 suming his straw by fire ! And yet as regards manure, 

 this would be more excusable than the combustion of 

 vegetable matter, inasmuch as the constituents of straw 

 have become more solidified, and require more powerful 

 means to effect decomposition than succulent vegetable 

 matter, and also far less valuable, much of its quality 

 being lost in ripening the grain. In ploughing in succu- 

 lent vegetables for manure, of course decomposition 

 immediately takes place without any preparation, and, 

 with almost every description, a very slight incipient fer- 

 mentation is only necessary to commence decay of the 

 woody fibre ; in fact, to allow any manure to ferment 

 to a great degree is highly prejudicial to the interests of 

 the farmer. Sir H, Davy even doubts whether strcao 

 would not be more beneficial as a manure if chopped up 



