^96 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER, 



JUKB 19, I!i30. 



more easily soluble by the plant, and better dif- 

 fused in the land. Mo r.ew compound is formed 

 by the mixture ; the action of the dung mixed witli 

 four or five times its weight of water is apparently 

 much less energetic ; and yet this plan is decided- 

 ly advanta<;cous, successfully prodticos the most 

 luxuriant crops, is an old practice on the continent, 

 is gaining ground in England, and tlie more it is 

 understood the oftener will it he adopted- 

 Liquid manure is called by the farmers of Switz- 

 erland ^«//f, in France it is called lizifr ; they ob- 

 tain it by collecting the drainage of their stalls and 

 stables into underground reservoirs or pits, where 

 it is allowed to ferment until it attains a slimy or 

 mucous state. The mode adopted by the cultiva- 

 tors of Zurich is thus described in the Bulletin de 

 la Soc. lie Geneve : — 



"The floor on which the cattle are stalled is 

 formed of boards, with an inclination of four inches 

 from the head to the hinder part of the animal, 

 whose excrements fall into the gutter behind, in 

 the manner usual in English cow-houses ; the 

 depth of the gutter is fifteen inches, its width ten 

 inches ; it should be so formed as to bo capable of 

 rec^ving at pleasure water from a reservoir placed 

 near to it ; it communicates with five pits by holes, 

 which are opened for the passage of the slime or 

 closed as occasion requires. The pits or reservoirs 

 of manure are covered over with a floor of board- 

 ing, placed a little below that on which the animals 

 stand ; this covering is important as facilitating 

 fermentation. The pits or reservoirs are made in 

 masonry, well cemented, and should be bottomed in 

 clay, well beaten to avoid waste. They should be 

 five in number, in order that the liquid may not be 

 disturbed during the fermentation which usually 

 lasts four weeks. Their dimensions should be cal- 

 culated according to the number of the animals held 

 by the stable, so that each may be filled in a week ; 

 but whether full or not, the pit must be closed at 

 the week's end, in order to maintain the regularity 

 of the system of emptying: the reservoirs are emp- 

 tied by means of portable pumps. 



In the evening, the keeper of the stables lets a 

 proper quantity of water into the gutter, and re- 

 turning to the stable in the morning, he carelully 

 mi.xes with the water the excrement wliich has fal- 

 len into it, breaking up the more compact parts, so 

 as to form of the whole an equal and flowing 

 liquid. During the day, whenever he comes into 

 the stable, he sweeps whatever excrement may be 

 found under the cattle into the trench, wliich may 

 be emptied as often as the liquid it contains is 

 found to be of the proper thickness ; the best pro- 

 portion of the mixture is three-fourths of water and 

 one-fourth of excrement, if the cattle be fed on corn, 

 but if in a course of fattening, one-fifth of excre- 

 ment to four-fifths of water will be sufficient." 



This mode of fattening cattle, says Mr Loudon, 

 is in general use in Holland and in the Nether- 

 lands, and we have seen it practised in France, at 

 Trappe and Grignion, near Versailles, at Rovile, 

 near Nancy, at Ebensberg and Schleipsheim, near 

 Munich, and at Hohenheim and Weill, near Stutt- 

 gard. 



With regard to the quantity of liquid manure to 

 be applied per acre, and tin,' best mode of ap|)lying 

 it, much must depend upon the circumstances un- 

 der which the cultivator is placed, and the richness 

 of the liquid : if the impurities dissolved or me- 

 chanically suspended in the water are only equal 

 to one part in ten, then twenty to tliirty tons per 

 acre of the liquid will be found to be amply suffi 



cient to produce the most excellent results ; if the 

 fluid mass is richer, then less will suftice. 



For gardens and small plots of ground the liquid 

 may be readily and evenly distributed over the beds 

 by means of a watering pot or garden engine ; for 

 fields it must be carried in water carts, and distrib- 

 uted either by being let into a transverse trough, 

 pierced with holes in the manner of the carts em- 

 ployed for street waterings, or the Flemish plan 

 may be adopted, of taking it into the fields in wa- 

 ter carts open at the top, (furnished with slight 

 movable covers,) and then distributing it out ofthe 

 carts very evenly by means of a scoop. 



I would suggest to the cultivator, in case he in- 

 tends to employ either the watering pot or any 

 other plan by which it will have to pass through 

 small holes, the advantage of straining the liquid 

 before he pumps it into the vessel, either through 

 coarse sand or a basket ; the pieces of straw and 

 other coarsely divided matters thus separated by 

 the strainer, he will find to add very slightly indeed 

 to the fertilising powers of the liquid, and yet they 

 will materially hinder the even distribution of the 

 manure. 



If it shall occur to the farmer that the quantity 

 of solid manure thus conveyed to the soil will not 

 in reality exceed two or three tons per acre, and 

 that this is in appearance a very small allowance, 

 I would then remind him that the quantity thus con- 

 veyed consists ofthe soluble or richest portion of 

 the manure, and is, in fact, the extract without any 

 of the straw or other inert residuum usually carried 

 on to the soil. I have elsewhere endeavored to 

 show that a flooding with river water so productive 

 of fertility in the water meadows, does not convey 

 on to the land more than two tons per acre of ani- 

 mal and vegetable substances, and in the very suc- 

 cessful experiments of the late Lord Somerville 

 with whale blubber, not more than a ton and a 



half per acre mixed with earth was employed 



The Essex farmers find three-quarters of a ton of 

 sprats amply suflicient, and two hundred weight per 

 acre of gypsum is the ordinary allowance ; it is a 

 mistaken conclusion, therefore, which is often en- 

 tertained by farmers, that manure must be added to 

 a soil in large quantities to produce a desired re- 

 sult. 



Liquid manure is easily and with excellent re- 

 sults applied to grass land ; it is perhaps the most 

 cleanly dressing that pastures can receive ; I should 

 advise, however, that wet or showery weather be 

 chosen for the time of watering, that the manure 

 may be more readily and completely absorbed by 

 the soil. In some experiments with the liquid col- 

 lected from a cow-house, ten tons per acre have 

 been found amply suflicient by Mr Hammond, on 

 some meadows near to Lewes, in Sussex. 



The land on which the manure was sprinkled by 

 means of a water cart has twice the quantity of 

 grass than that not so fertilized ; it is free from 

 weeds which have been evidently choked with the 

 grass, wliile the herbage ofthe other portion is poor 

 and short, and very foul. 



One great constituent of all the drainage matters 

 of dunghills consists of urine, and this substance 

 enters into the composition of almost all the arti- 

 ficially prepared liquid manures ; and there is per- 

 haps no fertilizer more powerful in its elTects. — 

 " All urine," said Sir Humphrey Davy, "contains 

 the essential elements of vegetables in a state of 

 solution ; during the putrefaction of urine the great- 

 est part of the soluble animal matter that it contains 

 is destroyed ; it consequently should be used as 



fresh as possible ; but if not mixed with solid mat- 

 ter it should be diluted with water, as when pure 

 it contains too large a quantity of animal matter to 

 form a proper fluid nourishment for absorption by 

 the roots of plants." 



Urine has been analysed by M. Berzelius, and 

 its constituents were found to be as follows : 

 Water 9.33.00 



Nephrin (a peculiar animal matter) 30.10 



Sulphate of potash 3.71 



Sulphate of soda 3.16 



Phosphate of soda 2.94 



Muriate of soda (common salt) 4.44 



Phosphate of ammonia 1.65 



Muriate of ammonia 1.50 



Lactic acid \ 



Lactate of ammonia > 17.14 



Animal matter mixed with nephrin } 

 Earthy phospates (earth of bones) and 



fluateoflime 1.00 



Uric acid 1.00 



Mucus 0.:32 



Silica 0.03 



1000.00 

 This analysis amply bears out the observation of 

 Davy, that urine contains the essential elements of 

 vegetables ; and hence the magic effects which it 

 produces when spread upon the earth : it contains 

 many constituents which are a direct food of plants, 

 and by the decomposition of others furnishes a sup- 

 ply in another form, containing all the ammoniacal 

 salts ofthe dunghill, the phosphate of lime of bones, 

 and abundance of easily decomposable animal mat- 

 ters. 



The urine ofthe cow has been analysed by Mr 

 Brande : he found it composed of — 



Water 65 



Phosphate of lime 3 



Muriate of potash ) , 



Muriate of ammonia ) 



Sulphate of potash 6 



Carbonate of potash • . 



Carbonate of ammonia ) 



Urea 4 



Loss 3 



100 



The urine ofthe horse has been examined by 

 M. M. Fourcroy and Vaquelin, and found to be 

 composed of the following substances : 



Carbonate of lime .011 



Carbonate of soda .009 



Benzoate of soda .024 



Muriate of potash .009 



Urea .007 



Water and mucilage .940 



The most extensive experiments with urine as a 

 fertilizer, with which I am acquainted, were tliose 

 made by Mr Ilarley, in the neighborhood of Glas- 

 gow, which he thus describes : " Early in the sea- 

 son, part of the proprietor's farm and some small 

 fields contiguous to the cow-house, were sown witli 

 barley and grass seeds ; these were watered with 

 cow urine, by means of an engine on the principle 

 of a fire-engino. There were also used for that pur- 

 pose hand-barrows with broad wheels, upon which 

 barrels were placed filled with urine. Under the 

 barrels were placed conductors, about eight feet 

 long, perforated with small holes. These barrows 

 were easily wheeled along the rich soft ground, 

 which would have been destroyed by horses and 



