286 THE RURAL EFFICIENCY GUIDE STOCK 



Whitewashes. 



Whitewash is the cheapest of all paints and may be used for interior or 

 exterior surfaces. It can be made as follows : 



1. Slake about ten pounds of quicklime in a pail with two gallons of 

 boiling water. Cover the pail with burlap or cloth and allow it to slake one 

 hour. Add enough water to bring the whitewash to a consistency which 

 may be readily applied. Adding fou-r ounces of carbolic acid to each gallon of 

 whitewash increases its disinfecting power. 



2. Whitewash for exterior surfaces (waterproof) : 



First. Slake one bushel of quicklime in twelve gallons of hot water. 



Second. Dissolve two pounds of common salt and one pound of sulphate 

 of zinc in two gallons of boiling water. Pour second solution into first, then 

 add two gallons of skim milk and mix thoroughly. 



Poultry Droppings. 



Poultry droppings are very good fertilizer as they are rich in sulphate 

 ammonia, kainit and high grade acid phosphate. One hundred birds running 

 at large on an acre should have added, in six months, to its fertility the equiva- 

 lent of at least one hundred pounds of high grade acid phosphate, two hundred 

 pounds of sulphate of ammonia, and sixty pounds of kainit. The droppings 

 should be saved during the winter. Twenty-five hens will produce in six 

 months three hundred seventy-five pounds of fertilizer from the roost drop- 

 pings alone. As a top dressing for grass, poultry droppings are exceedingly 

 valuable because they contain a large amount of nitrogen in the form of 

 ammonia compounds which are nearly as quick in their action as nitrate of 

 soda. However, droppings must be taken care of if they retain their value 

 because the gaseous contents soon escape. There are several chemicals, each 

 of fertilizing value in themselves, which can be added to the droppings now 

 and then with good effect, both in making the air of the henhouse more 

 wholesome and in stopping waste. They are: gypsum or land plaster, kainit, 

 cheap potash salt, acid phosphate. Each one of these chemicals forms a 

 compound with the ammonia as fast as it is set free from the original com- 

 bination. Plaster often forms a lumpy, dry mixture if used in large enough 

 quantities to stop the ammonia but kainit and acid phosphate make a moist, 

 sticky mass. Never use wood ashes or slaked lime as neither of these com- 

 bine with the ammonia but forces it out of its compounds and takes its place. 

 It is also well to add dry meadow muck or sawdust besides the chemicals. 

 It would require about one-half peck of either of these absorbents besides 

 about eight pounds of acid phosphate or kainit to the weekly droppings of 

 twenty-five hens when scraped from the roosting platforms. In case one 

 desired a balanced fertilizer for corn or some other hoed crop, he could use 

 equal parts of acid phosphate and kainit instead of either alone. 



