200 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



leached out, and carried into the soil below, than was applied to 

 any other equal portion of the field. 



I desire liere to say a few words upon the importance and 

 value of vegetable matter, in connection with the accumulation 

 of the manure heap, and especially upon lands which have been 

 materially exhausted of this element by successive cropping. 



Striking examples of this defect are seen in the worn out 

 lands of Virginia. The crops upon these lands have been stimu- 

 lated by the use of guano alone, without the addition of vegetable 

 matter, until the land has become so far exhausted of this 

 element as to be incapable of producing crops. The same may 

 be seen to some extent in most sections where an exhaustive 

 course of cultivation has been long continued. To supply this 

 want of vegetable matter, some recommend the ploughing in of 

 crops, either green, or in a dry state. For this purpose, clover 

 is, perhaps, superior to any other crop. But, where hay is in 

 demand, even at a low price, I think it better economy to feed 

 the crop, and return the manure to the land. 



A large portion of the solid excrements of neat stock is vege- 

 table matter. In the process of mastication, the hay has imparted 

 to the animal a portion of its starch, albumen, &c., but the great 

 bulk of the food which passes through as manure, is the finely 

 divided woody fibre of the hay. By the process of digestion, it 

 has been broiight into a state to be more readily appropriated 

 by the growing plant. 



To show more conclusively the value of vegetable matter to 

 the growing crop, and also the intrinsic value of urine, let me 

 cite an experiment made by the late Arthur Young. He took 

 five equal portions of a field, one portion of which he manured 

 with dry cut straw ; a second with an equal amount of straw 

 soaked five hours in fresh urine ; a third with straw soaked 

 fifteen hours ; a fourth with straw soaked three days ; and to 

 the fifth he applied nothing. The whole was tilled alike, and 

 sown with grain. The product in grain, of the first, was thirty- 

 nine, of the second, fifty, of the third, sixty-three, of the fourth, 

 one lumdred and twenty-six, and of the unmanured portion, 

 nine. 



In weight of grain and straw, the product of the several portions, 

 in the order above named, were, one hundred, one hundred and 

 twenty, one hundred and thirty, three hundred and forty-eight. 



