DAIRY CATTLE AND THE DAIRY FARM 131 



cow voids approximately 46 Ibs. of dung and 27 Ibs. of urine a day which 

 together make about 12 tons or with bedding included about 15 tons 

 annually. Under proper management at least 80 per cent, of the fertility 

 can be returned to the soil. If manure is to be stored, plenty of litter 

 must be used and the manure must be kept moist and compacted. To 

 prevent loss from leaching it must either be protected by a roof or kept in 

 a waterproofed cement-lined pit which will retain all fluids. Manure 

 cannot be stored without creating more or less of a nuisance. It will 

 stink, it will breed flies and unless unusual pains are taken, it will be so 

 disposed of in the barnyard that the cows will mouth it, and soil them- 

 selves by walking through it or by wading in the puddles that are formed 

 by its leachings in wet weather. Manure is often mixed with land plaster, 

 thrown through a trap door into the basement of the barn and stored there. 

 It is not a bad way of keeping the manure but it is attractive to flies and 

 rats, and is malodorous so that it is offensive, especially where hogs are 

 kept in the manure in the belief that they keep down the stench. Less 

 objectionably, manure is piled in sheds or lean-tos some distance from 

 the barn. The most wasteful way to keep manure is to heap it under the 

 eaves. It has been common for boards of health to require manure to be 

 removed a certain distance from the barn. Such regulations are probably 

 justified chiefly on the ground that they lessen the likelihood of milk being 

 deteriorated by odors but they are not very practical for it is not where, 

 but how the manure is kept that is of importance, and they often are the 

 cause of needless bickering between inspectors and owners. 



It is best to have some settled practice in applying the manure to the 

 land. The urine is the most difficult to deal with. There are two ways 

 of saving it ; the first is to absorb it completely by the liberal use of bed- 

 ding and the second is to lead it to an underground waterproofed cement 

 cistern from which it may be pumped into a sprinkler or onto a loaded 

 manure-spreader and applied to the land. 



The dung may be loaded directly into a cart or manure-spreader and 

 hauled out and spread on the land as soon as there is a full load. The 

 objections to this are: (1) that in winter in order to keep the manure 

 from freezing it is often necessary to carry it out before a full load has been 

 obtained; (2) that the land is frequently in such condition that it is im- 

 possible to drive on it; and (3) that the land that is to be fertilized is not 

 always ready for the manure. In spite of these drawbacks it is becom- 

 ing more generally the practice to apply the manure directly to the land 

 rather than to store it. 



Manure is handled in different ways. When the construction of the 

 barn permits it the cart or manure-spreader are driven into the barn and 

 loaded from the gutters. Some barns are equipped with manure-carriers 

 of which there are two kinds, the rod-track and the rigid-track. In^each 

 an elongated tank usually of galvanized iron is suspended from an over- 



