B76 REFUSE OF BEET AS MANURE. 



decomposition and diffused in water ; its effects, I imagine, would 

 not be doubtful. 



Oil-cake, as a manure, is employed at very different seasons, ac- 

 cording to the nature of the husbandry. It is always well to employ 

 it in rainy weather. Its effect is always certain, if it comes on to 

 rain two. or three weeks after it has been put into the ground. 

 Drought suspends its action ; it frequently happens, indeed, that the 

 first crop shows none of its good effects ; but these never fail to ap- 

 pear in subsequent crops. Schwertz remarks very properly, that 

 this circumstance has led many farmers to overlook the real advan- 

 tages that belong to this manure. Cake, in fact, according to the 

 dryness or moistness of the season, may act as a manure either of 

 difficult or of easy decomposition, and so produce more immediate or 

 more remote effects. In England about 800 weight of oil-cake per 

 acre are commonly applied. Mr. Coke, of Holkham, ploughed in the 

 powdered cake about six weeks before sowing turnips, but it is held 

 more economical and more advantageous to strew it in fine powder 

 along the furrow with the seed. The latter view, however, must not 

 be too confidently acted on by farmers ; the general recommendation 

 to sow the fields with powdered cake, either some weeks before or 

 some weeks after putting it in the seed, and when the plants have 

 already sprung, appears to be the right one. We have various ob- 

 servations made by one of our most experienced practical farmers 

 which prove that oil-cake used dry an<l without mixture often pro- 

 duces the most injurious effects uj)on germination. In September, 

 1821, M. A'ilmorin, desiring to make a comparative trial of different 

 jjulverulent manures, strewed a quantity of i)ow(iercd colewort-cake 

 upon a piece of red clover. Upon all the parts of the field which 

 had received other manures, applied in the same way, the clover 

 sprung perfectly ; but that which had received the oil-cake continu- 

 erl absolutely naked ; the cake had been employed in the proportion 

 of about 800 cwt per acre. The same result was also olitained in 

 a trial made with vetches and gray winter peas.* Duhamel, refer- 

 ring to similar facts, recommends the cake to he applied ten or 

 twelve days before sowing. In Flanders, from 6 to 7 cwt. per acre 

 is the quantity gerjerally em|)loyed for wheat crops, and it is scatter- 

 ed over the surface before winter sets in, when the grain is already 

 above the ground. 



The jmlp of llic beet-roo/ which has been employed in the sugar 

 manufactories of France and Flanders, is an article which as food for 

 cattle is known not to be infcrtfir to the root before it has undergone 

 expression, and it contains nearly the same proportions of sugar, al 

 bumen, ^'c. It is, tlierelore, always used as food to as great an e.x, 

 tent as possible. But the article is kept with dilliculty, and the j)ro 

 duction at times far exceeds the p»)w; rs of consumption, so thut i 

 lias to be made into manure, for which it answers excellently. Thi 

 skimmings and dregs which are collected in the process of sugai 

 making, are also available as manure. They contain about the same 

 amount of azote or azotizcd matter as farm dung, and are therefor* 



• Viliii:>rin, in Mid'^on Riis:;iimp vol. i. p. '204. 



