1872 LEAVES ^BEAN-STRAW. 



ter ; they perhaps absorb urine in smaller quantities than straw iloe». 

 but as they are much more highly azotized, they greatly improve the 

 quality of the dung. It is desirable that the materials used for litter 

 should be capable of imbibing a large quantity of liquid ; and these 

 same materials are by so much the more advantageous as the pro- 

 portion of azote which enters into their composition is high. The 

 leaves of trees combine both of these conditions, and are therefore 

 an immense resource in districts where they can be procured in 

 abundance. Where the woods are strictly preserved, the removal 

 of the leaves is generally prohibited ; and it is doubtless injurious 

 to deprive the soil of them in young plantations ; but where the tim- 

 ber is further advanced, the objections to their remi>val are infinitely 

 less, and it is therefore generally permitted to carry them away 

 within certain limits. And when it is seen that from natural causes 

 a great part of the leaves is actually lost to the soil of the forest, 

 the wind sweeping them into the ravines, whence they are carried 

 away by the rains, it is evidently far better to allow the poorer cul- 

 tivators to profit by them. The benefit obtained appears the greater, 

 as the time and labor bestowed in collecting the leaves is not taken 

 into the reckoning. 



Bean straw, and other stalks of a very hard and thready nature, 

 make but indifferent litter, they are often so hard that they hurt cat- 

 tle : and then their cuticle being impermeable, they absorb little or no 

 urine. It has been proposed to crush them in the mill or to cut them 

 in pieces, but either of these processes is attended with expense. 

 The best thing to do would sometimes be to place them where they 

 would get crushed under the wheels of the farm carts. The use of 

 woody stems of every description would be attended with unques- 

 tionable saving in the useful article of straw, and it must never be 

 forgotten that to economize straw as litter, is to increase the quan- 

 tity of available forage. If, for example, it were possible to reduce 

 to the state of litter the woody stems of the Jerusalem artichoke in 

 places where this vegetable is grown to any extent, the advantages 

 would be very decided ; the quantity of these stalks collected from 

 an acre may amount to from four to five tons ; the pith of which 

 they are almost entirely composed is of a very spongy nature and 

 well fitted to absorb fluids. These stalks are light, and properly 

 bruised, would probably replace an equal weight of straw, first as 

 litter and then as an element of the dunghill, instead of being burn- 

 ed as at present to heat the oven or to boil the copper, which seerns 

 of all methods the worst to derive any advantage from the woody 

 haum, whether of the Jerusalem artichoke, the potato, rape, &c. 

 These substances contain about 4 per 1000 of azote, and are most 

 profitably transformed into manure. We have found that by placing 

 them at the bottom of the dung-heaps, they end by undergoing de- 

 composition ; even the most woody stems of vegetables, indeed, de- 

 compose pretty rapidly when ihey are impregnated with urine and 

 mixed with the droppings of animals. Mere moisture without other 

 addition does not suffice, they then rot with extreme slowness. 



The green parts of vegetables buried in the ground with the wa- 



