BONES IN THE SOIL. 



173 



seven Scotch acres to feed forty-ciglit cows five and 

 a half months. In a word, it is only by saving the 

 fertilizers now wasted iu villages and cities that pure 

 and cheap millv can be obtained by their inhabitants. 

 In the best managed dairies on the continent of Eu- 

 rope, the liquid manure of a single cow a year is said 

 to be worth ten dollars; nor is this an extravagant 

 estimate, for the quantity voided is very considerable. 

 Now, instead of allowing more than a moiety of this 

 to run to waste, and depasturing stock on fields so 

 lX)or that several acres barely suffice to support one 

 cow in half keep to yield the maximum of milk, how 

 much better it would be to make the land rich by 

 carefully saving and applying the needful manure ? 

 Not only Italian rye-grass, but Indian corn, clover, 

 and other forage plants will turn out prodigious crops 

 for the production of milk and flesh, provided one 

 uses proper means in reference to soil and culture 

 Liquid manure is always available food for growing 

 plants; and on that account, it may be transformed 

 into new milk in a few days after it is applied as a- 

 top dressing to grass or green corn. Seasonable i r 

 rigation renders the dairyman almost independent of 

 injurious drouths. But if circumstances prevent his 

 enjoying the advantages of much diluted manure — 

 combining irrigation with manuring — let him at least 

 manure his pastures and meadows which are expected 

 to keep his live stock. The neglect of grazing and 

 meadow lands is one of the most prominent defects 

 in American husbandry. Plain truth is easily told ; 

 they need a great deal more of the food of plants 

 than they receive. Sooner or later, this fact will be 

 generally acknowledged, and made the basis of a 

 wiser system of farm economy. Cow-yards open to 

 all the rain that falls in spring, summer, and autumn, 

 to wash away the droppings of stock, will be un- 

 known in this country. All wash-water, soap-suds, 

 and house-slops of every kind, leached ashes, bones, 

 old leather shoes and boots, and woolen rags, will be 

 husbanded for their great value as manure. It is not 

 in large towns alone that fertilizers are thrown away; 

 the practice prevails in all rural districts as well. 

 Almost every farmer might easily double the profits 

 and value of his farm by enriching his soil, and cul- 

 tivating it belter. The first thing is to give the land 

 more of the essential elements of crops. 



To Dkstrot Rats or Mice. — Mix flour of malt 

 with some butter ; add thereto a drop or two of oil 

 of anise-seed ; make it up into balls, and bait your 

 traps therewith. If you have thousands, by this 

 means you will take them all 



BONES IN THE SOIL 



Professor Voelckkk, of the Royal Agricultural 

 College of England, has recently made some analyses 

 of soils, which indicate at once the importance of 

 such investigations, and the value of bone earth in all 

 cultivated lands. Every one at all acquainted with 

 agricultural chemistry knows that nearly one-half of 

 the ash of the seeds of wheat, maize, and other ce- 

 reals, is phosphoric acid. The earthy part of bones 

 consists mainly of this acid in combination with lime; 

 and it matters not how much lime be present in a 

 soil, if phosphoric acid be lacking, corresponding in- 

 fertility is inevitable. In the chalk districts of Eng- 

 land there are fields cultivated in wheat, where 100 

 pounds of mineral earth turned up by the plow con- 

 tain 95 pounds of carbonate of lime. iSto7ie brash 

 of this character, which lies geologically on the 

 " great oolite formation," yields an average of twenty 

 to twenty-eight bushels of wheat per acre; and of 

 barley of thirty to thirty-five bushels. It contains a 

 small fraction over one per cent, of soluble silica; 

 less than one and a half per cent, of alumina; and 

 124 parts of phosphoric acid in 100,000. Land of 

 this description rents at from fourteen shillings to 

 twenty-five shillings (English money) per acre. Stone 

 brash on the inferior oolite, although containing more 

 good clay and soluble silica, and only about eighty 

 per cent, of carbonate of lime, brings only about 

 half the annual rent received for the kind above de- 

 scribed. To a superficial observer, the brash on the 

 inferior oolite appears the better soil of the two, and 

 why it was less fertile was a mystery, till Dr. Voelc- 

 KER analysed both, and found in 100,000 parts of the 

 inferior oolite brash but 7 of phosphoric acid. If 

 carbonate of lime or chalk would suffice to form the 

 earthy part of bones, and the ash of the seeds of 

 plants, then this lack of phosphoric acid might not 

 impair the fruitfulness of the soil But there is no 

 other substance in nature that will perform the office 

 of this peculiar acid; and its economical value in the 

 growth of agricultural plants and animals is above 

 all price. 



In another kind of brash, called "corn brash," 

 from its rare productiveness of wheat and other ce- 

 reals, Dr. V. found 177 parts of phosphoric acid in 

 100,000. It had over eighty per cent of carbonate 

 of lime; less than three per cent of alumina; and 

 less than five per cent, of insoluble silicious matter. 

 It had, hqwever, over one per cent of soluble silica 

 'Phis land pays an annual rent of from one to two 

 pounds per acre, and yields from twenty-five to thirty 

 bushels of wheat 



