1853. 



NEW ENGLAND PARMER. 



323 



Of the organic manurea, those which the most 

 readily putrefy are the most rapid in their effects; 

 but then, on the other hand, they are the most 

 speedily exhausted; thus oil and fish, the most 

 rapid of fertilizers, are exhausted by the few first 

 crops, whilst bones, which decay more slowly, last 

 longer in soil. The effect of chopped woollen rags 

 is excellent for two years in heavy soils, and for 

 three in light soils. Farm-yard manure, when ap- 

 plied in a style of freshness, illustrates the same 

 result. Take two pieces of the same kind of soil 

 and manure one of them with a mixture of dung 

 and straw higlily putrefied, and the other with the 

 same mixture newly made, and the straw almost 

 fresh, it will be observed that the plants grown up- 

 on the land with the putrefied dung produce a 

 much better crop the first year than the other, 

 but the second year the land with the fresh dung 

 will produce far the best crop, and the same re- 

 sult will appear the third year, after which both 

 will appear equally exhausted. 



It is of the highest importance to the farmer 

 that he should obtain a correct knowledge of the 

 mode in which those manures operate which are 

 found to be advantageous to the growth of his 

 crops. He must discard from his mind all those 

 false conclusions which are sometimes drawn with 

 regard to an imaginary power assigned to plants 

 of generating vegetable substances, for they can 

 effect no such miraculous results. It is true they 

 can combine the gases or elements of vegetable 

 matters together, and form gluten, starch, gum, 

 sugar, woody fibre, &c. They can absorb and ar- 

 range with those earths and saline bodies, but the 

 oxygen, the carbon, the nitrogen and hydrogen of 

 which the first named are comprised and which 

 plants usually obtain from either the atmosphere 

 or the decomposition of organic matter, they can 

 no more create than they can form the lime or si- 

 lica which are present in most vegetables. Davy 

 proves this when lie made a plant of oat grow in 

 pure carbonate of lime and watered with distilled 

 water. It grew but weakly, although it had a 

 free supply of atmospheric air, yet the access of 

 all dust was carefully prevented. Upon analyzing 

 the plant it was found to have much increased in 

 carbonate of lime, but its silica was rather dimin- 

 ished. 



It should also be a received axiom with the far- 

 mer that there is no part of any decomposing ma- 

 nure, animal or vegetable, but what is either, in 

 its gaseous or fluid state, the natural food of plants; 

 thus the gases emitted by the putrefaction of a 

 dung-hill are as much lost to the vegetable mat- 

 ters of the soil, as also the liquid that is allowed 

 to run away from the heap, and such an injury is 

 never submitted to by the intelligent farmer but 

 from unavoidable necessity. 



The mixing of caustic lime with dung is a most 

 baneful practice, as it renders the ammonia caus- 

 tic and volatile to the highest degree, and causes 

 the loss of the most energetic portion of the dung. 

 When land requires lime it should be applied sep- 

 arately, as the lime will in a short time absorb the 

 oxygen from the air and form carbonate of lime 

 and carbonic acid, in which state it is most benefi- 

 cial to the soil, botli for the absorbing of mois- 

 ure from the air and supplying the embryo plant 

 with carbonic acid, which is essential to its germi- 

 nation and future growth. But to return to my 

 former subject. We sec the value of green ma- 



nures, for in these cases every portion of the de- 

 caying and fermenting fertilizer is gradually ab- 

 sorbed by the roots and leaves of the succeeding 

 crops. Mattuew A. Perry. 



Waterlown, May 10, 1853. 



FOOD OF PLANTS— MODE OF SUP- 

 PLY—NOURISHMENT. 



Carbon, oxygen and hydrogen exist abundantly 

 in plants. Nitrogen is contained in them in some- 

 what less quantity ; but is essential to their growth 

 and nourishment. It is this last element, nitro- 

 gen, to which the cereal grains and other products 

 owe their nutritive quality ; being a principal 

 component of gluten, which exists largely in all the 

 grains, and most in wheat. It is on account of the 

 greater proportion of gluten in wheat that this is 

 more nutritious than the other grains. Wheat 

 approaches nearer to animal flesh than most other 

 vegetabies, nitrogen and phosphate of lime being 

 in large part the constituents of both. 



These several substances which are essential to 

 the nourishment of plants, are absorbed by them 

 from the atmosphere, by the action of their leaves 

 and their general surface, and also taken up from 

 the earth by their roots. The four elementary 

 substances named are the principal constituents 

 of all vegetables. They, however, mostly absorb 

 some earthy matter by their roots, as phosphate 

 of lime already mentioned, and silica, which are in 

 this way taken up by wheat and constitute impor- 

 tant ingredients in the vegetable economy. 



The mode by which this food is taken up and 

 assimilated to the vegetable organism, is matter 

 r^ only of curious knowledge but of most useful 

 instruction to the farmer. And we shall, there- 

 fore, in a few words explain the process. 



Most of the oxygen contained in vegetable sub- 

 stances is taken up by them either in combination 

 with carbon or hydrogen. These are chiefly ob- 

 tained, by respiration, from the atmosphere, by the 

 leaves and general surface. When the first of 

 these gases is taken in with hydrogen, the com- 

 bined substances form water ; when taken in with 

 carbon the united substances form carbonic acid, 

 the surplus oxygen escaping in respiration. Ni- 

 trogen is taken in by the plant in the same way, 

 us\ially in combination with some of the other at- 

 mospheric constituents. By its union with hydro 

 gen in the tissues of plants ammonia is formed, 

 which is most essential to the nourishment of all 

 vegetables. The principal supply of this substance, 

 ammonia, is, however, taken up by the roots. 



Beside the earthy matters above mentioned, si- 

 lica, phosphate of lime and ammonia, potash, in 

 some form, is found in many vegetables. Of these, 

 each different species of plant has some one or more 

 essential to its growth, though not requiring a 

 large supply. The substances, in fact, absorbed 

 from the atmosphere alone, have been found suffi- 



