FARMERS' REGISTER— EXPERIMENTS ON MANURES. 



667 



sea, is impelled towards it ; and beinf^ condensed 

 by the foIia;ie of the tree, the rain falls into a large 

 tank, from which it is measured out by individu- 

 als set apart for that purpose by the authorities of 

 the island. 



In confirmation of a circumstance prima facie 

 so incredilde, I have here to record a phenome- 

 non, witnessed by myself, equally extraordinary. 

 I had frequently observed in avenues of trees, that 

 the entire oTound engrossed by their shady ibliage 

 was completely saturated with moisture; and that 

 during the prevalence of a fog, when the ground 

 without their pale was completely parched, the 

 wet which fell from their branches more resem- 

 bled a gentle shower than any thing else; and in 

 investigating the phenomenon which I am dis- 

 posed to consider entirely electrical, I think the 

 elm exhiluts this feature more remarkably than 

 any other tree of the forest. 1 never, however, 

 Avas more astonished than I was in the month of 

 September last, on witnessing a very striking ex- 

 ample of this description. I had taken an early 

 walk, on the road leading from Stafford to Lich- 

 field : a dense fog prevailed, but the road was dry 

 and dusty, while it was quite otherwise with the 

 line of a few Lombardy poplars ; for from them it 

 rained so plentifully, and .so fast, that any of them 

 might have been used as an admirable shower 

 bath, and the constant stream of water supplied 

 by the aggregate would (had it been directed into 

 a proper channel) have been found quite sufficient 

 to tuin an ordinary mill. 



EXPERIMKNTS ON MANURES. 



Extract from the Southern Piantsr. 



The question is not where to find manure — it is 

 every Jkvhere ; but how to dispose of the force of 

 the farm to the best advantage in collecting that 

 which is most valuable with the least labor. It 

 would be as absurd to undertake to tell a man 

 ■what occupation would insure a fortune without 

 receiving any attention, as to point out to a plan- 

 ter where he will get abundant supplies of manure 

 without labor. Any occupation is a fortune in 

 time, with care and attention ; and manure is eve- 

 ry where, if we employ Die time and labor neces- 

 sary to collect it. The important fact to know, is 

 that animal excretions are the essence of manure ; 

 ■whatever can be mixed with tjiem will have a ma- 

 nuring quality imparted to them without diminish- 

 mg their quality to manure. 



But there is one source of manure as inexhaus- 

 tible as the water of tlie ocean, always at hand, and 

 more valuable than the mines of Peru, that as yet 

 passes little noticed and seldom employed. We 

 have only to properly ascertain its value and bring 

 it into general use, and we will never be at a loss 

 for materials to manure with. Manure will al- 

 •ways beat hand more than we want. The objects 

 will be to learn how to economize in the time and 

 labor necessary to collect it, and he most judicious 

 mode of employing it then will receive considera- 

 tion another time. We will at this time j)ass on 

 to make some observations on this never to be ex- 

 hausted source of manure, which each and every 

 planter has at command as abundant and inex- 

 haustible as he could desire — this is red clay. 



A pint of blood was taken from my arm. I had 

 it poured round a stalk of young corn ; the plant 

 soon sickened and died. A few days after I was 



bled another pint. This blood I haS well mixed 

 in about a half bushel of tolerably dry red clay, 

 taken from a tree root that had l)een blown down 

 many years ago. This wheiv well mixed was suf- 

 fered to remain so several days, and one half of it 

 was applied to a corn stalk ; the other half had as 

 much clay added to it, well mixed, and allowed to 

 remain a few days, when one half was again ap- 

 plied to a young stalk of corn ; the other half was 

 again mixed with as much more clay, and used as 

 belbre ; so I continued it until applied to six 

 stalks ; the last stalk, therefore, had one half bush- 

 el of clay, and 1-64 of a pint of blood ; yet when 

 the corn was all grown I could not jjerceive much 

 difference. They were all good, the last being 

 little the best. It was, however, latest, and the 

 late rains were best. My conclusion was, the one 

 was about as well manured as the other. Several 

 holes were made where the hills of corn were to 

 grow. About a week before planting I put in one 

 about a peck of strong unrotted manure from my 

 stable; another peck of manure was mixed with 

 about a busliel of dry red clay — one half of which 

 was put in the next hole ; the remainder was again 

 mixetl with the same quantity of clay, and used as 

 before, uniil the six holes were manured ; the last 

 hole, therefore, had a bushel of red clay, and 1-64 

 of a peck of horse manure ; they were all planted. 

 The year was dry. The stalk that had only horse 

 manure pined and made little corn. Of the other 

 six there was little dilTerence. In both these ex- 

 periments, rows of unmanured corn were on both 

 sides of the manured rows, and the difference was 

 very great. 



I had two little stables in which I kept my sad- 

 dle horses, one in each stable. Both of these sta- 

 bles I occasionally had filled with stalks, straws, 

 leaves, &c. as near equal as I could make it ; but 

 in one I would every now and then have a load of 

 clay thrown. I had two little pens made, in which 

 the manure was put wiien the stables were empt- 

 ied. The stable which had clay, I thought had 

 perhaps twice as much as the other. When it 

 was taken out, a hole was dug down to the red 

 clay, a layer of manure was put in, then a layer of 

 clay, and so continued, so that one pen, on a rough 

 estimation, contained three-fourths clay and one- 

 fourth manure ; the other pen all manure. Plant- 

 ing time, three pieces of rows of drilled corn and 

 cotton were used for the experiment. The ridges 

 being opened, the furrows were well manured, one 

 of each with fresh dug clay , one of each with the clay 

 and manure mixed, and one of each with the ma- 

 nure alone. Of the cotton, I could not perceive 

 that the clay alone did either good or harm. Of 

 the corn, it did decided injury. Of the cotton, the 

 clay and manure was beautiful ; of the corn, 

 equally so. Of the cotton, the manure alone was, 

 I thought, a Z///^e the best ; of the corn, the manure 

 alone was worst of all. It })ine(! and looked like it 

 would die at one time. It was very dry ; late rains 

 however brought it out, and although it did not 

 look well, yet the ears were large, and perhaps it 

 made as much as the other. 



, Now, do not these experiments, if correct, prove 

 that animal excretions are the essence, if we may 

 so call it, of manure.? That any quantity of vege- 

 table matter, when mixed with them, acquires a 

 new quality of manuring from them, and that when 

 we have put as much vegetable matter as we can 

 get or as we choose, that it will all become as ani- 



