106 



THE GENESEE FARMER. 



seen industrious farmers hauling street dirt, and other 

 worthless trash gathered up in cities, sLx or seven 

 miles into the country for manure, that was not worth 

 ten cents a load; for what was not clay and sand, was 

 substantially wood and water. Such men never sit 

 down of an c\ euiug, take a volume of the Genesee 

 Farmer in hand. ;uid study out the true reason why 

 a ton of guano is worth fifty dollars for feeding to 

 one's growing L-rups, while a ton of comuuin barn- 

 yard manure is worth only one-fiftieth part of that 

 sum. It is not enough to know that the bird-dung 

 contains fifty times more ammonia or nitrogen than 

 the dung of straw-fed cattle, altliough a clear vmder- 

 standing of this fact is certainly worth not a httle to 

 the practical husbajidraan. It suggests to him at 

 once the propriety of cultivating pretty largely such 

 plants as ^^ ill \-ield manure rich in nitrogen or am- 

 monia. A thousand pounds of wheat or rye straw 

 contains not to ex:;ecd four pounds of nitrogen, while 

 the same weight of clover Lay contains twenty-four 

 or five pounds. Peas, beans and cabbages are still 

 richer in the most valuable elements in guano. The 

 wise and economical production and consumption of 

 manure constitute the back-bone of scientific agricul- 

 ture. We h.n.\Q on hand several lettei's of inquiry in 

 reference to manure-cellars under stables and barns. 

 A barn or stable with this appendage can be cheap- 

 est made where one has a side-hill, or slight elevation 

 into one side of which he can dig, plovr and scrape 

 out the earth to forar a capacious storage room for 

 manure. This basement should, in all northern lati- 

 tudes, be wailed up on three sides at least; and a part 

 of it may be used for stables, for thestorage of roots, 

 or both. Manure made without exposure to the 

 weather is as much better to nourish plants as good 

 hay, made without rain or de\v, is better than that 

 which has been washed and whitened a month for 

 feeding cattle. The practice of feeding agricultural 

 plants on bad food is discreditable to the rural 

 knowledge of the country. If one is unable to pro- 

 cure but little manure, by all means have that little 

 of the very best quality. The woody stems of grass, 

 the insoluble part of cow-dung, is about as rich in 

 nutritive properties as pine saw-dust. It is better 

 calculated for heating stoves and ovens than to fee 1 

 and fatten growing corn plants. These tolerate no 

 SJiw-dust diet; they demand aliment rich in phosphates 

 of potash, lime, magne.-ia and soda, and rich in am- 

 monia and carbonic acid diluted in water. 



Large crops \dl\ bring a heap of money next au- 

 tuum and winter, and now is the time to provide 

 moans for their grovdli. On our farm we e.^timate 

 a bushel of hard wood ashes, unlea':-hed, as worth 

 twenty cents for aiding in the growth of corn and 

 potatoes. A bushel of salt and one of gj'psum to 

 five of a;;hos, make the latter far more effective. If 

 salt and plaster t.-ere as cheap in Washington as they 

 are in Rochester, we should use at least fifty of plas- 

 ter and one hundred and fifty of salt this spring as 

 food for growing corn,^ in addition to other manure. 



By planting corn too thick — havhig the rows too 

 near to each other, and too many plants in a hill — you 

 may gain in forage, but you will lose in gram, es- 

 pecially if the soil be not first rate. 



■ m * m 



Cabbage grows wild in Sicily and Naples. 



HINTS FOR PRACTICAL MEN. 



In reading the twelfth volume of the TransaclUms 

 of the JVcw York Slate ./igricultural Society, the 

 following remarks, which may be found on page ,")97, 

 made by Henry Yoiwg, of Owcgo, we characterize 

 as valuable hints for practical men : " Barley or oats, 

 being sown on land well pre})ared by tillage and ma- 

 manure, will come up and grow well without r^in, 

 when the same grain sown on another part of the 

 same land, and not thus manured and tilled, will scarce 

 come up at all without rain, and if they do, will vvait 

 wholly for rain for their growth and increase. The 

 hoe also, particularly the horse-hoe (for the other does 

 not go deep enough), pi-oduces moisture for the roots 

 from dews, which fall most in dry weather." Deep 

 and perfect tillage increases the supply of moisture 

 to the roots of plants, not by the collection of dew 

 below tlie surface of the gTOund, as Mr. Youxc ap- 

 pears to believe, but by a different law than that 

 wliiclj precipitates dew on falling bodies. A leaf of 

 corn, oats or grass becomes wet with dew on a clear 

 night because it radiates heat rapidly, and thereby 

 becomes, like the sm-face of a pitcher filled with cold 

 water in July, colder than the suiTounding atmos- 

 phere. The pitcher is soon covered with a genuine 

 dew, like the cool grass in early morning. "i 



Finely tilled earth is calculated to imbibe heat 

 rather than radiate it; and the moisture it acquires 

 aliout the roots of thirsty plants in dry weather is not 

 " dew," but water from another source than precijii- 

 tatioH. Before explaining the phenomenon to the 

 unscientific reader, we will copy all that Mr. Yol'X(; 

 has to soy on the subject: "'I'hese dews seem to b.e 

 the most enriching of all moisture, as they contain a 

 fine black earth, which Mill subside on standing, and 

 which seems fine enough for the proper i)abulum or 

 food for plants. As a demonstration that tilled earth 

 receives an advantage from these dews, dig a hole in 

 any jjiece of land of such depth as the plow goes to, 

 till it witli powdered earth, and after a day or two 

 examine the place, and the bottom jiart of this earth 

 and the bottom of the hole will l^e moist, while all 

 the re.st of the ground at the same depth is diy ; or 

 if a field be tilled in lauds, and one laud be made liir' 

 by frequent deep plo wings, while another is left rough 

 by insutlicieut tillage, and the whole field be then 

 plowed across in the dryest weather which has long 

 continued, every fine land will turn up moi.-t, taid 

 every rough land as dry as powder, from top to 

 bottom." 



'I'he remarks last made call attention to facts of 

 great importance; and we are prei)aved to iu(juire 

 how it hiij)j)ens that so nmch more moisture is found 

 in thoi-oughly tilled earth than in badly tilled earth, 

 in dry weather. To understand this phenomciion, it 

 should be remembered that most of the dew that falls 

 6n the leaves of plants evaporates again after tli'^ sun 

 rises, and very little if any water enters the pores of 

 leaves, and descends to the roots of plants through 

 their stems. The water that keeps plants green and 

 growing in dry weather is derived mainly from the 

 subsoil, and invited to ascend by bringing the earth 

 above it into the best pos>i!de condition ibr the fice 

 circulation of water, by a law called capillary attrac- 

 tion. Direct experiments v.ith finely j)ulverized earth 



