38 Orange County Manures. Jan., 



commonly recommended to have tanks constructed, either under 

 the floor of the stables, or in such convenient place as the liquid 

 can easily be conducted to. These tanks are then to be filled with 

 charcoal or peat to absorb the liquids which flow into them. And 

 this is a very good arrangement, but in the construction of tanks, 

 conductors, &c., it is attended with unnecessary expense, which 

 can be easily obviated, and yet the same object be effected. To 

 do this, let the floors of the stables be laid so that the plank shall 

 be a small distance apart — just enough to allow all the urine to 

 flow through. Let some of them be moveable, or else doors made 

 elsewhere, through which the space below can be at any time 

 filled with peat. In this condition it will absorb the liquids as 

 well as in tanks, and plaster or a solution of sulphate of iron 

 (copperas) can occasionally be added, to prevent any waste that 

 is liable to occur. The peat may be taken out at any time that it 

 becomes saturated, and mixed with the contents of the yard or 

 added to the compost heaps, and its place supplied with more; or 

 if enough can be put in to last till time to carry it out on the 

 land, that may be done ; but the former plan is preferable. 



One great consideration in manuring land is to supply, as far 

 as possible, the precise substances which are wanting. There 

 may be a great abundance of vegetable mould in the soil, and not 

 enough of those substances which constitute the ash when plants 

 are burned. It would therefore be unwise to apply the peat itself 

 to the soil. But the ashes of peat will be a capital application. 

 For this purpose the peat should be cut up in square blocks, and 

 thoroughly dried, and then piled in large stacks and burned, and 

 the ashes strewed over the soil. It is probable that over a large 

 area in Orange county, this would be the best w^ay to use the peat. 

 At the same time it can be advantageously applied as directed 

 above. Peat may very easily be converted into most excellent 

 manure by the agency of animal matter or potash. The former 

 is mentioned because an animal often dies upon the farm or in its 

 immediate neighborhood, whose carcass is suffered to waste in the 

 open air, or is buried at once, where it can never be of any use. 



