110 The Cowpost-Yard. 



Vegetadle Mould. — Although this is not indispensable in the compost- 

 yard, it is of eminent service ; still it must be confessed that a gardener 

 with good loam, sandy heath soil and old manure, can grow any plant in 

 existence well. Vegetable mould is of various kinds, although what the 

 gardener terms leaf-mould is the most popular. But, in truth, when in a 

 highly decomposed state, it signifies little what this humus is derived from , 

 whether leaves of trees and shnibs, decomposed weeds, or indeed anything 

 that has once been a growing vegetable, water- weed and mosses excepted. 



Manures. — It would seem almost superfluous to recommend manures for 

 the compost-yard, since they are in general the first things thought of. We 

 wish, however, to point in a special way to one or two of importance to 

 the plant-grower, as also to show the best mode of handling them. The 

 old dung from decayed hotbeds is a favorite manure with most gardeners, 

 and very useful it is for general purposes, provided ifc has been frequently 

 turned, and well handled by the spade. But the most useful manure of 

 all, in our opinion, is very old cowdung. This should be at least twelve 

 months old ; in fact, when in proper order for the potting-bencb, it should 

 resemble well-humbled peat soil. There are other manures of great power, 

 when high concentration is required ; but we pass by them. We may 

 here direct the reader's attention to one great fact : that since the utility 

 of liquid manure has been generally recognized, the gardener feels much 

 less anxious about the introduction of manurial matters into his soil. 



Sand is another important affair to add to the compost-yard — indeed, 

 a material we cannot do without. There is scarcely a compost made up 

 by a good gardener, but sand, less or more, finds a place in it. Sand for 

 this purpose should be very sharp, fine and clean. 



^Ye have here enumerated a few things which should be in every com- 

 post-ground, and we may now be permitted to offer a few remarks pertain- 

 ing to the general economy of composts. 



In the first place, a compost-yard must be perfectly dry beneath ; no 

 water must lodge here, or the composts will be seriously damaged. Second- 

 ly, all soils or composts should at all times be piled up in the form of a 

 sharp ridge, in order to exclude rain, which robs them of their virtues. 



The best time, in our opinion, to collect the various soils, &c., is the 

 month of September. The turfy loam in our fields, commons, &c., is then 

 full of the fibrous produce of the past summer, and the soil may be ob- 

 tained dry if the proper opportunity is sought. Ey the way, this obtaining 

 soils when in a tolerably dry condition is a point which we must particu- 

 larly direct attention to ; soils handled in a wet state lose half their char- 



