XII.] MANURING BY FEEDING 243 



seeds in the early winter, to act both as a fertiliser and 

 as a mulch. The seeds benefit greatly, and at the same 

 time much of the added fertility is retained for the corn 

 crop that follows ; manuring the young seeds is certainly 

 preferable to the very general custom of manuring the 

 old ley before it is ploughed up for wheat or oats. A 

 certain amount of the farmyard manure made on the 

 farm should, however, always be reserved for the 

 meadow land, especially on light soils and on land 

 comparatively newly laid down to grass. Of course, 

 dung would be wasted on rich grazing land ; it is the 

 thin light soils that are cut for hay, or grass land that 

 has only been laid down for a few years and has had no 

 time to accumulate a stock of humus, which are most 

 benefited by an occasional dressing of farmyard manure 

 — once in every four or five years. 



In Great Britain many farmers use but little fertiliser 

 for their land beyond the farmyard manure that they 

 make, but this farmyard manure contains not only the 

 fertilising constituents which have been drawn from 

 the soil of the farm and are contained in the roots and 

 hay fed to the stock and the straw that has been 

 trampled down as litter, but they also enrich the dung 

 by the consumption of imported feeding stuffs, such as 

 oilcakes, maize, and feeding meals, etc. It therefore 

 becomes a question of some importance to determine 

 what extra value is imparted to the manure by these 

 purchased feeding stuffs. Specially is this important 

 when the tenant is about to leave a farm, when the 

 dung that has been made during the last year of his 

 tenancy still remains in the yard and has not produced 

 a crop. If purchased linseed cake, cotton cake, maize, 

 and similar foods have been fed to the stock which 

 made the manure, there will be left on the farm nitrogen 

 and other valuable constituents which are just as much 



