^^ERlCAfi HERD-BOOli 



H^ DEVOTEDTO 



AGRICULTURE, HORTICULTURE, AND RURAL AND DOMESTIC AFFAIRS. 



Perfect Agriculture is the true foundation of all trade and industry. — Liebig. 



Vol. X.— No. 2.] 



9th mo. (Septemter) 15th, 1845. 



[Whole No. 128. 



PUBLISHED MONTHLY, 



BY JOSIAH TATUM, 



EDITOR AND PROPRIETOR, 



No. 50 North Fourth Street, 



PHILADELPHIA. 



Price onedoilarper year. — Forconditionsseelastpage. 



Communicated for the Farmers' Cabinet. 



Experiments Avith Guano. 



The following interesting account has been kindly 

 forwarded for insertion. It is part of a letter from 

 Edward Stabler, of Sandy Spring, Md., to S. K. George, 

 of Baltimore, and is dated in the Seventh month last. 

 We copy from the Rockville Weekly Reporter.— ^o. 



All my experiments with guano, have 

 not alike proved successful ; and as it some- 

 times occurs, that even in a failure, either 

 the operator himself, or others, derive future 

 benefit by investigating the causes, I vv'ill 

 give the results in both crises. I think I 

 can very readily trace to the proper cause 

 some of the failures reported. 



Experiment \st. — On a field of oat stub- 

 ble, which was in corn the previous year, 

 and had from 75 to 100 bushels of lime to 

 the acre, I selected a strip of one acre, near 

 the middle, and extending through the field; 

 after ploughing, the land was once harrow- 

 ed ; — the ground broke up very dry and in 



Cab.— Vol. X.— No. 2. 



bad order for seeding — and about the 7th of 

 the Ninth month (September) 200 pounds of 

 guano were sown by hand, without admix- 

 ture with anything; the ground was again 

 well harrowed, and after remaining a couple 

 of days, for the guano to assimilate with the 

 soil, it was sown with about two and a half 

 bushels of Mediterranean wheat; then well 

 harrowed and rubbed in. About half of the 

 field, and adjoining the guano on one side, 

 was just previously sown with the same 

 kind and quantity of wheat, with the addi- 

 tion of twelve bushels of ground bones to 

 the acre. 



On the other side of the guano, and in- 

 cluding the remainder of the field, there 

 were about twenty-five ox cart-loads — 35 

 bushels to the load — of barn-yard manure to 

 the acre ; and the seeding, the same as the 

 other parts. In two or three weeks it was 

 evident at a glance, that the guanoed part 

 had the start in vegetating; and which it 

 steadily maintained until harvest. 



The relative growth of the crop was 

 generally estimated by those who examined 

 it, at about the same yield, for those portions 

 with ground bones and manure; but inferior, 

 by 33 to 50 per cent, to the guano — that 

 there was this difference, I am fully satis- 

 fied; but having only harvested the guanoed 

 part separately, we cannot tell "what the 

 half bushel says." For experiment, the 

 quantity of ground bones was varied on 

 several adjoining lands; at no time was 

 there a marked difference, between six and 



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