118 TALKS OX MANURES. 



" The grain-grower has straw in excess ; he tries hard to get it 

 into such form that he can draw it to his fields, and get it at work, 

 at the least cost in labor. So he covers his barn-yards deep with 

 straw, after each snow-storm, and gets his cattle, sheep, and horses, 

 to trample it under foot ; and he makes his pigs convert all he can 

 into such form that it will do to apply it to his pastures, etc. , hi 

 winter or early spring. 



" A load of such manure is large, perhaps, but of no very great 

 value, as compared with well-rotted stable-manure from grain-fed 

 horses ; but it is as good as much that I have seen drawn from 

 city stables, and carried far, to restore the worn-out hay-fields on 

 the shores of the North River in fact, quite like it. 



" The dairyman, generally, has but little straw, and his manure 

 is mostly dung of cows, worth much more, per cord, than the 

 straw-litter of the grain-growers. 



" The grain-grower will want no sheds for keeping off the rain, 

 but, rather, he will desire more water than will fall on an open 

 yard. The milkman will wish to protect his cow-dung from all 

 rains, or even snows ; so he is a great advocate of manure-sheds. 

 These two classes of farmers will adopt quite unlike methods of 

 applying their manure to crops. 



" I have cited these two classes of farmers, simply to show the 

 difficulty of making any universal laws in regard to the treatment 

 and use of barn-yard manure. * * * 



" I think you and I are fully agreed in regard to the farm being 

 tlie true source of the manure that is to make the land grow bet- 

 ter with use, and still produce crops perhaps you will go with 

 me so far as to say, the greater the crops, the more manure they 

 will make and the more manure, the larger the crops. 



" Now, I object to any special farming, when applied o a whole 

 great division of country, such as merely raising grain, cr devoted 

 entirely to dairying. 



" I saw at Rome, N. Y., thcso two leading branches of New- 

 York farming united on the Huntington tract of 1,300 acres. 

 Three or four farms (I forget which) had separate and distinct 

 management, conducted by different families, but each had a dairy 

 combined with the raising of large crops of grain, such as wheat, 

 corn, oats, etc. These grain-crops, with suitable areas of meadow 

 and pasture, sustained the dairy, and the cows converted much of 

 the grain, and all of the forage, into manure. Thus was com- 

 bined, to mutual advantage, these two important branches of New- 

 York farming. Wheat and cheese to sell, and constant improve- 

 ment in crops. 



