28 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. [Jan. 



Professor Whitcher. The practice of the gentleman 

 accords entirely with what I believe. I do not believe in 

 burying manure. There used to be a notion that manure 

 had a wonderful tendency to climb, and that we would lose 

 a great part of its value in the atmosphere if it was not 

 buried pretty deeply ; but the fact is that the loss of manure 

 is in the other direction, — downward. The water that 

 passes through the manure soaks down into the subsoil, 

 especially where you have a sandy subsoil. It goes down 

 much faster in a subsoil of that character than it does in a 

 clayey one. That is one danger in burying it too deep. 

 Again, decomposition does not take place so rapidly as when 

 it is near the surface, and therefore it is not so rapidly made 

 available for the crop. My belief is that it should be kept 

 near the surface and mixed as thoroughly with the soil as 

 possible, not carrying it down more than two or three 

 inches, and then let the water wash the plant food down, 

 and distribute it through the rest of the soil. The loss, as I 

 have said, is downward, not upward. * 



Mr. Lynde. I a*m in the habit of using sand as an 

 absorbent. Now, is that the best way to save the plant food, 

 and does it pay? Of course there is an expense in carting 

 the sand in, there is a good deal of time spent in spreading 

 it in the gutter, and then it takes time to move it onto the 

 field. Is that practice a paying one? 



Professor Whitcher. Perhaps I can give my idea of 

 that by stating what we do. We buy sawdust and go five 

 miles to get it, whereas we could get sand for much less, and 

 would only have to go about two hundred rods to get it. 

 We had rather pay ten times as much for sawdust, and take 

 all the labor of hauling it the extra distance, than use sand. 



Mr. Lynde. Why? 



Professor Whitcher. I will tell you why. In the first 

 place, the sawdust is very light to handle. In the second 

 place, if you have cows you can keep them clean much more 

 easily. If you use sand, it gets onto their udders and 

 drops into the milk. You may say that you can clean 

 the udders and get the sand otf, but the man who will do 

 that must be a better man than I can hire. Another 

 thing is, a given amount of sawdust will absorb a great 



