112 THE BOOK OF THE LANDED ESTATE. 



is considered a good manuring to lay on eighteen tons of seaweed per 

 acre. At Fort- William, Ballahulish, and Oban, on the west coast of 

 Scotland, the fishermen collect the seaweed into heaps and sell it to the 

 farmers at Is. per cartload. It is used along the coast of Yorkshire 

 chiefly as a topdressing to grass-land, for which purpose it answers 

 well ; the grasses are much improved by it. It is found, however, to 

 act much better when mixed into compost -heaps along with road- 

 scrapings. 



It is the custom with many good farmers to plough in a crop of 

 clover, rape, or mustard as manure, and it is a practice found to be 

 of great benefit. Some excellent practical farmers affirm that a crop 

 of rape ploughed in, enriches the soil twice as much as it would if 

 the crop had been eaten off "by sheep. It is a good practice to eat 

 green crops on the ground by sheep, if the land be of a light nature ; 

 but to heavy land there is more benefit derived by ploughing the crop 

 in, as the vegetable matter has the tendency to open the soil and make 

 it free. 



I have seen in Forfarshire a turnip crop sown broadcast on the land 

 after harvest, and allowed to grow for about two months, when it was 

 ploughed in, and the improvement to the land was very evident. In 

 Kent it is a custom in the hop-plantations to bury all the prunings of 

 the plants as manure. 



SECTION 3. Animal Manures, Blood, Bones, Nightsoil. 



Any animal matter enriches the soil to a great degree. Dead animals 

 such as horses or cows should not be buried in a mass, but rather 

 chopped up and mixed in a compost-heap along with other substances ; 

 of course I mean when the animals have been killed by accident, or from 

 non-infectious disease in the latter case they should be employed as a 

 manuring agent. 



Blood makes an excellent mixture in a compost-heap. It is a great 

 error to allow so much of the refuse of slaughter-houses in towns to go 

 to waste, as is usually done. In some parts of the south of England 

 compost-heaps are made with peat, peat-ashes, and charcoal, upon 

 which the blood is thrown in the proportion of about five gallons of 

 blood to two bushels of the heap mixed together ; and this is applied 

 at the rate of about forty bushels per acre by itself, or with twelve 

 bushels of the compost, along with ten or twelve tons of ordinary 

 farmyard manure. The blood is sold at 3d. per gallon in some of 

 the southern counties. In Paris the blood is collected and dried, and 



