l^^ 172 THE GENESEE FAKMER. ( pi 



than to lay down rules for the preparation and use of manure, to which there could be 

 but few exceptions in practice. No such uniformity in circumstances exists ; and on 

 that account, very much must be left to the sound judgment of the husbandman. There 

 can be no reasonable doubt that manure dissolved in water (a weak solution) can be 

 most evenly diffused through the whole mass of soil to which it is applied. Water 

 holding the organic and inorganic aliment of plants in solution, permeates the earth 

 wherever it is possible for roots to extend. In this condition, their daily nourishment is 

 always ready for use ; but when a mass of raw, insoluble dung or vegetable matter, is 

 buried in the earth or spread upon its surface, the case is entirely different. In time, 

 this solid will dissolve ; but being in large lumps, the sand, clay, and mould that imme- 

 diately surrounds the manure, will imbibe it all and leave three-fourths of the soil as 

 devoid of fertilizing atoms as it would be had no manure been spread on the land. All 

 who are familiar with agriculture in districts where the soil is naturally thin, and fre- 

 quently badly worn, must have seen grass, gTain, and other crops, grow in bunches on 

 partially manured fields. This is owing to the extreme unevenness with which the fer- 

 tilizers have been applied — some plants (a very few) have a feast, others a continuous 

 fast. In all such cases, the manure does not do half the good to the land and its crops 

 that it is capable of; and nothing in tillage and husbandry more needs reform than the 

 defective manner in which soils and manures are mixed together. Composts so covered 

 with loam, mold, ashes, and charcoal, as to lose none of their gases, nor soluble salts, 

 should be rotted sujfficiently to break up into fine particles before spreading, plowing in, 

 and harrowing. In this way alone can one readily incorporate manure Avith clay, sand, 

 and mold, so that it will wholly disappear. 



But it is frequently inconvenient to wait for manure of any kind to rot before it is 

 used ; and it is desirable to know how it can be best applied. It should be spread with 

 much greater care, broken finer, and distributed evener, than is generally practiced. 

 This rule holds good whether dung is applied as a top-dressing to meadows and 

 pastures, or to plowed, or about to be plowed, lands. The equal diffusion of the fertil- 

 izer through the body of the soil from its surface down to the depth at which the roots 

 of crops descend, is the perfection of manuring by the aid of any given quantity. Its 

 extreme division greatly favors its solution in the earth, and the proper feeding of the 

 farmer's needy crops. Some say that the natural tendency of fertilizers is to rise to the 

 surface, and therefore manure should be covered deep with the plow ; while others con- 

 tend that manure naturally sinks with the water that descends to form springs, or runs 

 out in under-drains; and therefore manure should be covered only two or three inches 

 in depth. Both of these statements are partly true and partly erroneous. All the dis- 

 solved food of plants both ascends and descends around their roots to nourish and sup- 

 port vegetation. The evaporation of water from the surfece of the ground, and from the 

 numerous leaves of plants and forest trees, induces an upward movement of water from 

 the subsoil ; but when it rains, or from any cause there is more moisture in the surface 

 soil than in the earth below it, water descends and manure with it, if soluble and present 

 on the surface. The droppings of all animals in a state of nature enrich the land with- 

 out the aid of the plow or harrow, or being covered with earth. Art and science under- 

 take to do more than imaided nature accomplishes ; and a large increase of physical as 

 well as other comforts, is attained. But for some reason, the art and science of agricul- 

 ture are less studied, and less investigated in a philosophical way, than any other in the 

 whole range of useful knowledge and occupations. The nice adaptation of manures to 

 the peculiar wants of every crop, is a point in farm economy now universally neglected. 

 Defects in soils are attracting some attention ; but how to remedy these defects in the 

 cheapest manner, is a desideratum that can never be realized until there is more system 

 in our vague and meaningless researches as practical farmers. What new truths did the 

 -i L three millions of agriculturists in this country develop in the year 1851 ? ,^ 



