148 



THE GENESEE FARMER. 



desire to contribute my mite to the general fund of 

 agricultural knowledge. 



Peruvian Guano. — I consider this one of the 

 most valuable fertilizers yet discovered. It is used 

 to an enormous extent in England, and all the efforts 

 which have been made to manufacture an artificial 

 fertilizer equal to it for wheat and other grain crops, 

 have as yet proved abortive. Its use on the im- 

 poverished soils of Delav/are, Maryland and Virginia 

 has increased the value of these lands in the aggre- 

 gate millions of dollars over and above the cost of 

 tie guano. On this point there can be no doubt. — 

 Yet it must not be inferred from this that the use of 

 guano on all farms will be profitable. In fact I am 

 well satisfied that it \yill not. If the land without 

 any manure will produce fifteen bushels of wheat per 

 acre, 200 pounds of Peruvian guano would make it 

 yield twenty bushels per acre. The guauo would 

 cost $6, and where wheat is worth not more than ^1 

 per bushel, the use of guano entails a loss of $1 per 

 acre. If wheat is wotth $2 per bushel, there will be 

 a gain of ij?! per bushel. The economy of using gu- 

 ano on such lands, therefore, depends on the price of 

 wheat. The case is somewhat different on the im- 

 poverished farms of Delaware, Maryland and Virginia. 

 The land there, in many instances, produces little 

 more than the seed, and its cultivation would have to 

 be abandoned but for the aid of artificial fertilizers. 

 The use of 200 pounds of guano costing $6 produces 

 a crop of fifteen or twenty bushels per acre, on land 

 that could not be profitably cultivated without it. — 

 Farmers there must either use guano or abandon their 

 farms, and it is easy to see that v>'e should be wrong in 

 concluding from the fact that guauo is there used 

 with profit, and has doubled and trebled the value of 

 farming lands, that its use would be profitable in 

 sections where wheat can be grown with jwofit with- 

 out the aid of artificial fertilizers. 



But cannot guano be used with advantage on 

 other crops than wheat, in sections where the land 

 will yield fair crops without guano, but which never- 

 theless will produce much larger crops by the aid of 

 guano? I believe it can. Take for instance pota- 

 toes: In ordinary seasons an acre of potatoes yields 

 more money, (not, necessarily, profit,) than wheat. 

 In the case of wheat, we have assumed that 200 lbs. 

 of guano increase the crop one-third. If the same 

 amount of guano will increase the crop of potatoes 

 one-third, and a crop of potatoes is worth more than 

 a crop of wheat, it follows that there is more profit 

 from the application of guano to potatoes than to 

 wheat. This is not a speculative conclusion merely. 

 I have known 300 pounds of Peruvian guano increase 

 the field of potatoes 100 bushels per acre. In other 

 words, without guano, the yield was 100 bushels, and 

 with guano 200 bushels per acre; and I might men- 

 tion that the potato grovrers around Albany are per- 

 fectly satisfied that the use of guano is very jjrofita- 

 ble on their poor sandy lands. 



The same remarks apply with equal truth to onions, 

 carrots, tobacco and many other crops. On onions 

 especially, I have found guano a very effective man- 

 ure, and the relative high price of the crop makes its 

 use very profitable. 



Superphosphate of Lijie. — I have not had much 

 experience in the use of the manures sold under this 

 name in nearly all our large cities; but I have made 

 superphosphate from bones, burnt and ground, and 



used it with considerable advantage. I made it after 

 a receipt given in the Genesee Farmer. Take 100 

 pounds of ground bones, (the finer the better,) and 

 wet the bone dust with thirty pounds of water, and 

 then add forty pounds of common oil of vitriol. la 

 a few days this will form a plastic mass of rich man- 

 ure, which I dry by mixing with it coal ashes, (wood 

 ashes will injure it unless they are leached.) For let- 

 tuce, turnips, cabbage, celery, cucumbers, melons, and 

 nearly all garden vegetables, except potatoes, this 

 manure will be found very beneficial. It may be 

 placed in immediate contact with all seeds without 

 injury, and has a remarkable effect on the production 

 on the small fibrous roots of the plant and pushes it 

 forward rapidly to maturity. This effect is veiy 

 marked on turnips. 



I may here say that I would not be without super- 

 phosphate of lime or guano for my garden vegetables 

 if it cost double its present price. Both these man- 

 ures act rapidly, and are therefore under more imme- 

 diate control. They can be applied at any time du- 

 ring the growth of the plant either in the dry or 

 liquid state. They have the additional advantage too 

 of being free from weeds. 



PouDRETTE, Tafeu, &c.— Every farmer should man- 

 ufacture this article for himself, and not lose his money 

 in purchasing the commercial article sold under these 

 names. I have no hesitation in saying that a good, 

 cheap commercial poudrette has yet to be made. 



Compost Heaps. — No farm or garden should be 

 without its compost heap. The limits prescribed to 

 this article, precludes allusion to their management ia 

 detail, or to the substances of which they might pro- 

 fitably be composed. I may be allowed to say, how- 

 ever, that leaveSjWeeds, and decayed vegetable and ani- 

 mal substances of all kinds should find their way to the 

 compost heap. The soap-suds and other waste liquid 

 from the house should be thrown upon it, and if you 

 have sufficient loamy soil to prevent all possibility of 

 escape of ammonia, the spare wood and coal ashes, 

 lime, &c., might be scattered on it from day to day as 

 they accumulate. Pieces of woolen rags, scraps of 

 leather, hair, dead animals, &c., when thoroughly de- 

 composed without lofs, as in a com.post heap, afford 

 the best of all fertilizers — more powerful even than 

 the best Peruvian guano. I consider the compost 

 heap oue of the " most economical modes of obtain- 

 ing fertilizers, other than barn-jard manure." 



Mineral Manures. — Ashes, leached and unleach- 

 ed, lime, plaster, marl and other mineral manures, may 

 be so used as to add much to the fertility of the farm. 

 As a general rule, they are most useful applied to 

 clover, peas, beans, turnips and other crops which ob- 

 tain nearly all the'r ammonia from the atmosphere. 

 Mineral manures seldom benefit wheat and other grain 

 crops, but when applied to clover, peas, grass, &c., 

 they increase their growth; and these crops, consum- 

 ed on the farm, furnish an increased quantity of fer- 

 tilizing matter of great value to the high priced 

 cereals. 



Irrigation. — In England and many European 

 countries, nearly every farm has its water meadow, 

 which is made to produce an immense amount of hay 

 by irrigation. Boussingault considers these irrigat- 

 ed low lands the most economical source of manure. 

 There can be no doubt that we have in this country 

 thousands of acres of land that might be irrigated at 

 little expense, and which would furnish, without man- 



