SAVE THE LIQUIDS. 



127 



-Wolff. 



To secure the urine of our farm-stock deserves, therefore, a 

 most careful attention. Its presence is essential for the pro- 

 duction of a complete fertilizer, for the reproduction of the 

 crops which served as food ; its absence depreciates the value 

 of the stable manure more than one hundred per cent. To 

 suffer the liquid manure to waste, means loss of nitrogen, 

 and potassa in particular. The fresh animal secretions con- 

 tain but little ammonia ; they evolve it largely, however, 

 soon, in consequence of a peculiar process of fermentation, 

 and are thus liable to suffer seriously in nitrogen compounds. 



As humus and a rich loamy soil, or turf, are in a superior 

 degree qualified to absorb ammonia, they deserve recommen- 

 dation for that purpose. 



Dry, fresh, vegetable, refuse material, as straw, leaves, and 

 so forth absorb readily the liquid manure, yet they are but 

 little fit to take care of the ammonia before they have changed 

 to a certain degree of humification. 



An addition of soil or a daily sprinkling with pulverized 

 gypsum, or crude sulphate of magnesia, is, for this reason, (^ 

 particular importance in case of fresh stable manure ; partly 

 Totten manure, if properly mixed, does not evolve ammonia 

 to aiay extent. 



The incorporation of all kinds of vegetable refuse material, 

 incidental to the industry pursued, into the stable manure is 

 to be recommended, for they decompose more readily when 

 mixed with highly nitrogenous substances, like the animal ex- 

 cretions ; and they tend to render the stable manure moj-e ef- 

 ficient for the crops under cultivation. Grain and straw con- 

 tain the same articles of plant-food, and differ merely in re- 

 gard to the relative proportion of the latter. 



Numerous actual experiments made in connection with 

 stock-feeding have furnished us with a good mode to calcu- 



