234 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



Of the importance and value of farmyard manure, Dr. Cam- 

 eron, of the Dublin Chemical Society, says, " Farmyard manure 

 is the best manure which can be applied alone, inasmuch as it 

 contains all the elements required to nourish every kind of 

 cultivated plant." But it is of little consequence what the 

 value of the solid or liquid excrements are, unless they are 

 husbanded. If manure heaps are exposed to the wash of rains, 

 or if the drippings from the eaves to our buildings are allowed 

 to run into the barnyard, until the yard is filled with water, 

 and finally run off into the highway, or if no absorbents are 

 used to save the liquids, but they are suffered to leach away, 

 and so are lost. Bedding of some sort or other, whether it 

 be of sawdust, sand, muck, or straw, when put under the stock, 

 serves a twofold purpose, that of keeping the animals from 

 filth, and to absorb the liquid manure. Too much cannot be 

 said upon the importance of saving the urine of all our stock, 

 for we are told by those who ought to know, that it is of equal 

 value with the solids. 



Those who have recently adopted barn cellars, or barnyards 

 entirely covered, tell us that they can see a difference in the 

 strength of the manure, which I account for by the fact that it 

 is all saved, both liquid and solid; none is lost by the wash of 

 rains. 



MUCK. 



Of the materials which are used as fertilizers, which are 

 composed of vegetable matter, muck, or peat, may be considered 

 as standing at the liead, not only because of its value of itself, 

 but because of its abundance. 



Although muck may not be found on every farm, yet there 

 are but few towns in which there are not large quantities. 

 There is in the town in which is the residence of the writer, a 

 number of muck swamps, some large and some small. One of 

 these is situated some five hundred feet above the Connecticut 

 River, and contains about twenty acres, and will probably 

 average ten feet in depth, and consists wholly of vegetable 

 matter, easily cut and free from stone or stumps. Now if it 

 is true, as claimed by Prof. Dana, that two cords of muck, 

 when mixed with one cord of stable dung, will make three 

 cords, each of which will be of as great value for manurial 



