G2 THE FABM. ' 



potash or soda, has had a wonderfully educating influence in this respeci 

 .Farmers have marveled to see the large results from application of a few 

 hundred pounds per acre of these fertilizers, and in some quartere these re- 

 sults have led to an iindervaluation of the home-made manures. The fact 

 that the concentrated feitihzer, being deposited generally with the seed, is 

 more immediately available, does not demonstrate its superiority except for 

 the single crop to which it is applied. The farmer who owns the land he 

 tills, as most American farmers do, is interested not only in immediate pro- 

 fits, but iu maintaining, if not increasing, the fertility of his soil. It behooves 

 such a farmer to make himself thoroughly posted as to the comparative 

 value of stable and barnyard manures made from different feeds and by dil- 

 t'cTCnt animals. 



There is a much greater variation in the value of stable manure than is 

 nsually supposed, and this not depending on the amount or quahty of the 

 litter used as an absorbent, but rather on the excrement itself. A well-fed 

 horse standing idle in the stable passes more of the manurial value of what 

 he eata in his excreta than the same horse fed on the same material and 

 hard at work. The nitrogenous and phosphatic materials that are of great- 

 est value for all crops are precisely those which are retained in the working 

 animal to repair the waste of sinew and bone from labor. There is an equal 

 and invariable difference in manure, depending on the kind and value of the 

 food used. It does not follow that food of highly fattening qualities will 

 make rich manure. Few materials are more fattening than siigar, but as 

 sugar is only cai-bon, though it will lay on fat rapidly, it adds httle of value 

 to the manure pile. OU-meal makes a valuable fertilizer, for while the oil 

 in the meal is fattening, it is also rich in phosphates. English farmers have 

 grown rich, or, what is the same thing, made their farms rich, by feeding 

 oU-cake to fattening animals. The oil, of little value manurially, went into 

 the fat cattle and sheep, while the principal part of the most valuable fertil- 

 izing material was returned to their fai-ms. We have other feeds costing 

 much less than oil-meal, which for the resulting manure are nearly or quite 

 as valuable. Among the least understood of these feeds is wheat-bran and 

 coarse middlings. These are rich in the phosphates, comparatively poor in 

 fattening qualities, but of more value for working animals than is generally 

 supposed. It has been found by experiment that a mixture of -wheat-bran 

 with corn-meal makes a much better feed for work-horses than corn alone. 

 It is not only in diluting the com, which by itself is of too heating a nature, 

 that such a seed is valuable, but the bran is absolutely richer in nitrogen 

 and greatly richer in phosphates than the corn-meal. 



The time will undoubtedly come when progressive farmers in the older 

 sections of the country Mill feed for the purpose of making the most valuable 

 manures with as mtich carefulness as they now feed for growth, milk, wool, 

 or fat. In large sections of the country most of the profit of feeding must be 

 found in the manure pile. As this fact becomes better recognized, the ma- 

 nurial value of certain feeds and the difference in the resultant manures will 

 receive that attention which its importance in the farm economy ddserves 



Ho-w to Eni-ich tlie Soil. — The Fann and Fhrsidfi says: The produc- 

 tion of paying crops on old, upland clay soils depends largely upon restoring 

 to it, in the most economical way, the plant-food most needed by the crop to 

 be grown. If com is to be grown, manures containing a liberal amount of 

 phosphoric acid and potash will be required. As these substances are valu- 

 able, constant cropping with corn Vii\\ soon greatly diminish the value of the 



