388 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER, 



jrirurK is, ^str.. 



MARL.— ITS NATURE AND EFFECTS. 



The following extract from Professor Rogers' 

 late Geological Report, will give our agricultural 

 readers some more distinct idea of this reinarka- 

 I)le, iinil recently much talked of manure, which 

 abounds in IVlonmouth and other counties of New 

 Jersey. 



Marl or green mineral loses nothing of its jio- 

 tency by a long exposure, even of years to Water 

 and the atmosphere ; in other words, it is not dis- 

 solved, or decomposed, or changed, by the ordi- 

 nary atmospheric agents which react so power- 

 fully upon many other minerals, and consequently 

 we are to regard it as nearly tact, with it to ef- 

 fect its decomposition, by tlie vital power of their 

 organs, and imbibe a portion of some of its con- 

 stituents. 



" Mr Wooley manured a piece of land in the 

 proportion of two hundred loads of good stable 

 manure to the acre, applying uj.on an adjacent 

 tract of the same soil I, is ujarl in ilie ratio ol about 

 twenty loads per acre. 'Ihe crops, wliii-h were 

 timothy and clover, were much the l.eaviest upon 

 the section which had received the marl ; and there 

 was this anditional fact greatly in favor of the fos- 

 sil manure over the piitrcseent one, that the soil 

 enriched by it, was entirely free of weeds, while 

 the stable manure rendered its own cj-op very 

 foul. 



'This being an experiment, an extravagantly 

 large dressing of manure was employed, but not 

 exceeding the usual average application more than 

 twenty loads of nuirl surpassed what was necessa- 

 ry for it. 



' Experience has already shown that land once 

 amply marled, retains its fertility with a little dim- 

 inution for at least ten or twelve years if care be 

 had not to crop it too severely, while with all 

 practicable precautions, the stab'e manure must 

 be renewed at least three times in that interval to 

 maintain in the soil a corresponding degree of 

 vigor. 



'The high and deservedly high name, which the 

 Sqilaiicum Marl now boasts, was an inducement 

 to me to subject it to chemical examination with 

 s; ecial care and rigor. In external aspect it dif- 

 fers in no respect from many other marls of the 

 State, and, chemically studied, I do not find it to 

 depart very materially from several others in the 

 proportion of its constituents, though it does most 

 certaiidy possess an amount of potash in its com- 

 position not a little astonishing. Others, however, 

 seem to have nearly as much. 



' At the pits which are very extensive the marl 

 is sold at the rate of 37 1-2. cents the load. 



It is transported by wagons to a distance, in 

 some directions of twenty miles, and retailed, when 

 haidi'd that far, at the rate of ten or twelve cents 

 a bushel — being \ery profitably spread upon the 

 soil in the small proportion of twenty five or even 

 twenty bushels to the acre. The fact that so small 

 an amount of this marl is found efficacious to the 

 soil, which after two or three dressings is perma- 

 nently improved, and to a high pitch, by it, fur- 

 nishes me one consideration for supposing that too 

 generally the marl is spread with a prodigality sur- 

 passing all the necessities of land. 



'A spc ciinen of the marl from Thorp's lowest 

 layer yieliled me, after reiterated trials, uniformly 

 about the following, for its composition. j 



Silica 



Protoxide of iron 



Ahunina 



Lime 



Potash 



Water 



43,40 

 21,60 



6,40 

 10,40 

 14,48 



4,40 



99,68 in 100 

 grains 



In connexion with the foregoing extracts we add 

 a few facts and experiments collected from the 

 gentlemen whose names are used : — 



Messrs Tunis and John B. Forman say that 

 they have used Squancum Marl, at the rate of 

 100 bushels to the acre, on very poor, worn out, 

 iMild clay land : the produce of the first year was 

 30 bushels of buckvvheat to the acre — and the 

 second year (it being sowed the year before with 

 clover and herd) it cut a ton or more of good hay 

 per acre, after which about one hundr.nl bushels 

 of marl per acre were scattered over the seed, and 

 it now yields two tons of good hay per acre. They 

 have also resuscitated mowing ground, after it had 

 become too poor to produce a crop, by sp.eading 

 100 bushels of marl per acre over the sod, and the 

 effect was to mellow the soil, and produce two 

 tons of hay to the acre ; the hay produced was of 

 a superior quality, and free from weeds. One 

 hundred bushels of marl to the acre of land, so 

 poor as to have been considered useless, will raise 

 a crop of from 12 to 20 bushels of rye per acre, 

 and leave a fine sod of white clover. From three 

 pints to two quarts of marl per hill of potatoes (the 

 hills three feet apait on poor ground) has produc- 

 ed from 200 to 250 bushels per acre. They have 

 fi)und the marl a very superior manure for tur- 

 nips, and garden truck in general. The effect of 

 marling lands planted with apple trees, has an as- 

 tonishing efl^ect in improving the trees and fruit. 

 They have kiu)wn marl to be spread on Ix)g mea- 

 dow, and to cause double the quantity of superior 

 hay to be jiroduced. A neighbor of theirs, a few 

 years since, sowed out of a basket, about 6(i bush- 

 els of marl, on three or four acres of very poor 

 land, and reap d about 100 bushels of buckvvheat. 



Dr. Forman states that two or three years ago 

 he broke up a small piece of land, which forty 

 years had been considered too poor to plough, and 

 ajiplied about 100 bushels of marl per acre ; the 

 land produced a good crop of rye and has cut 

 about a ton of clover hay per acre every year since. 

 He also states that Squancum Marl was first used 

 about thirty years ago by Derick Chamberlain, 

 under the name of creefe mud ; it caused the piece 

 of land thus manured, to produce double the 

 (|uantity it had done before, and the eflT^ct on the 

 land is still visible. — Franklin Mercury. 



Paste made by putting acetate or sugar of lead 

 into it, instead of the old way of mixing it with 

 alum, keeps it from moulding, clear, and quite 

 moist for months together. We have heard that 

 Hodgson, of Harthbiirn, communicated this mode 

 of making paste to a book binder in Cin-sitorstreer, 

 London, in 1819; and that he has found from long 

 experience tliat it is by far the most useful way he 

 has ever heard of. 



Dr. Tier of Germany has invented a process, by 

 means of which beet root can be transformed into 

 solid white sugar, in the space of eight hom-s. The 

 produce in October and December last, under his 

 process including the molasses, was from 9 to 10 

 per cent. 



ROOT CULTURE. 



We have publisheil several articles showing th» 

 manner of culture, and the : dvantages of cutivat. 

 ing roots for Stock. We are ple'ased to find thti 

 fiu-mers are turning their attention to this subject, 

 and while the scarcity and high price of hay ii 

 fresh in their minds, we hope that many will try 

 experiments. But they should not try exfieri- 

 mints on too small a scale, 'i hey may raise Ruti 

 Baga, Parsnips, Carrots, Mangel Wurtzel, and 

 other roots on a small piece of gromid in the gar- 

 den, spade up the ground, wheel on the manure, 

 or carry it in a basket, dig the ground ove.,beal 

 the little sods in pieces, throw off the stones and 

 turfs, make up a little bed, sow it by a p'ece of 

 board in rows so near that weeds must be pulled 

 up with the fingers; and perhaps the expense ol 

 raising them in this manner will be a I'ollara 

 bushel, and the experinjenter, will suppose thai it 

 costs more than it comes to, and become discour- 

 aged ; when with proper management, thesi; rooH 

 might be raised with one sixth part of ihe expenss. 

 Roots are raised in the cheapest manner by those 

 who are prepared to sow by machines and destroy 

 the weeds and loosen the soil mostly with cultiva- 

 tors. But with le-s preparation and on a smaller 

 scale we have raised roots with little expense, but 

 have never raised many of one kind, as we have 

 sometimes cultivated 15 or 20 varieties in order to 

 learn which is preferable. We take a piece of 

 mellow rich soil that has been planted one year 

 or more, if here be stones on it, they should he 

 removed, put on the mai.ure, plough the ground, 

 harrow it several times. If the ground be rather 

 wet a id liable to be injured by heavy rains, throw 

 it into beds, by ploughing in the alley and turning 

 a furrow each way. 'Ihe beds should be narrow 

 or wide, and the alleys deep or shallow according 

 to the general dryness or wetness of the soil. Some 

 soils are so dry as to need no alleys to drain them, 

 others so wet that deep alleys, narrow beds and n 

 large quantity of light manure are necessary ; by 

 this process we have made a soil sufficiently dry, 

 which before was called a mud hole on which it 

 was ditiicult to pass with a team in hauling hay 

 on account of mire. 



Sowing. With one corner of the hoe make a 

 drill across the beds whi( h may I)e done as fast 

 as you can walk, then drop the seeds and cover 

 them with a hoe, all of which may be perforraeJ 

 in a shoit time. '1 he earth shouid be pressed up- 

 on carrot seed if it be dry: we do this by patting 

 with the hoe, or if it be very dry we walk on the 

 drill after it is sown. The drills should be 15 or 

 18 inches apart for carrots and two feet for rnanfel 

 wurtzil, then with a small hoe the weeds may be 

 destroyed and the ground loosened with very litile 

 expense. In this manner we have raised ruti 

 baga, carrots and wurtzels as cheap as we could 

 raise the same quantity of potatoes on the sauie 

 gruimd. It may cost more to cultivate the same 

 ground with other root.s, but they usually yield 

 twice or three times as much as potatoes. 



We received the following information, as to 

 the cidtnre and value of carrots, from l\!r Levi 

 Hutchins, of Concord N. H. He planted sixtysix 

 rods mostly with carrots, and he raised 30C busli- 

 els by particular measurement, and eleven bush- 

 els of onions and twelve of beets. 'I he soil was a 

 pine plain with a sub.stratum of clay, which was 

 ploughed up and mixed with the soil. The year 

 previous it was greensward, hud about fifteen 

 common cartloads of manure to the acre, was only 



