THE 



..GRICULTU R A L GAZETTE. 



Sjtfitt AH t£ 8 JUT ~ 



not such ■•»* . ^ rentg ^ but woul(i have 



"Yuppose this had happened; suppose that in 

 addS some vehement tenant farmer had started 

 un exclaiming in the words reported to have been 

 employed by Air. Alcock, « I am not going to be 



not — . 



redaction of 10 per cent 

 50 per cent. off. 



allowed 15 days for doing this work, in which case 

 400 ducks would secure 100 acres. Upon such a 

 proportion 20 or 30 might be employed on a small 

 farm to great effect. R. 



"lam 

 ruined if I can help it. 1 have not the slightest 

 idea of having my property destroyed. 1 na^e not 



equivocation whatever, ana aojuui „ ow - i 



4th my eyes open, allow that interest to be carried 

 my, and lost to me and to yourselves, if I can help 

 kT- and then had added, that thinly way in 

 which he and others could be saved was by com- 

 pelling tte British Government to compound wuh the 

 National creditors for 10s. in the pound. What we 

 say, would Mr. Alcock have replied to thaU And 

 yet it would not have been more unreasonable than 



his own wild harangue. 



The scheme for securing agricultural prosperity 

 by reducing, by main force, the price of guano from 

 <//. to 5/., is so absurd that we should not have 

 noticed it, had the proposal originated with a person 

 of inferior station to a member of the House of Com- 

 mons and a representative of an English county. 

 Mr. Alcock argues that, if farmers would refrain 

 from using guano, the Peruvian Government would 

 be compelled to sell it at half price. Another man 

 might as well argue that, if people would refrain 

 from eating meat, the grazier would be compelled to 

 sell his beef and mutton at half price. 



But would the proposed measure have the effect 

 anticipated ? Certainly not. We are not the only 

 customers of the Peruvians. Vast quantities of 

 guano go elsewhere. And the truth is, Peru 

 better afford to lose us, than we to lose Peru. 



in July in shoals, and is caught 



a 



9?**% 



can 

 We 



must have guano, and that, thanks to the hubbub 

 created by Mr. Alcock, is too well known on the 

 shores of the Pacific. The effect of this preposterous 

 clamour is far more likely to be an advance than an 

 abatement of the price ; and on this ground, as well 

 as that of the otherwise suicidal doctrines which 

 Mr. Alcock continues to advance, we once more 

 protest against his proceedings. 



Cannot the honourable gentleman perceive to 

 what his principles immediately tend ] Or is he pre- 

 pared to follow in the course of the old buccaneers ? 



One of the most remarkable of the agricultural 

 incidents of the present season has been the sudden 

 appearance of the Turnip caterpillar over the whole 

 island, and the havock which it has made on one 



MANURES.— No. IV. 

 Flesh is rarely employed as a manure, except in the 

 case of a dead horse or the refuse of the shambles, 

 when such remains ou?ht to be mixed with earth, as they 

 fertilise a large quantity of matter. Dry flesh leaves 

 23 lbs. of animal matter. Blood is more largely em- 

 ployed as a manure than flesh, being used in extensive 

 quantities as it comes from the slaughtering houses. 

 lu France it is dried, and in a state of powder dusted 

 over the crops, but the better way is to make it into a 

 compost. It consists of the same elements as flesh, and 

 strange to say, in nearly identical proportions ; there 

 are found in blood fibrin or muscle, which is analogous 

 with tfe gluten of vegetables; albumen (albumen, 

 white of egg) similar to that found in vegetables, winch 

 preserves wood when combined with a metallic salt. 

 Blood when cold coagulates or thickens ; divides into 

 a liquid and solid part ; the former called serum, 

 abounding in albumen, which, from its absorptive power 

 of impurities, is used for clarifying or refining sugar ; 

 this explains why bullock's blood is employed m 

 the refining of sugar, and the just value at- 

 tached to the refuse of sugar refineries. Dry 

 blood leaves 4*43 per cent, of ash, rich fa the 

 phosphates of soda, lime, and magnesia. Skin is more 

 frequently used in the preparation of glue ; the parings 

 of the hides, as they come from the tan-yard, when 

 applied to loamy soils, at the rate of 35 bushels (a bushel 

 costs # 6d), should be well covered in the ground, or the 

 effluvia from their decay will attract crows, which will 

 root up the ground, as in the case of bones and sea- 

 weed—in searching for worms. In cold or temperate 

 climates, the bodies of sheep are covered with a curled, 

 and closely-matted kind of hair, called wool ; owing to 

 its roughness and curly form, when manufactured into 

 cloth it thickens in the milling, and forms a close texture 

 —hair will neither thicken nor form any texture. 

 These are the distinguishing features. Woollen rags are 



the herring, 



30,000 hogsheads being sent to'markJ^ 6 V"**- 

 are of the herring tribe-in length EJ ft" 

 caught m immense numbers off the i> • • \° ""*«- 

 Yarmouth, and in the Bristol Channrf ."••»« 

 30 barrels of them have been b™ 1T\ P artl <*hfl 

 single haul. The refuse of 

 source of fish manure 



one of refuse. How great the supply mnVt'? 3 ! H* 

 Yarmouth the « mart " of the SrriWW ^ 

 barrels are annually cured ! Our • ' 



-Wnto\r»> 

 1 4 barrels of herrba *gj 



tt 



ai ™3 trade, 60,(U| 



rant of the mode of « curing » thisfish tn,] T* ^ 

 x!n ai._ — 1 _r xi. - -i t ii . j * u u it was oot 



na tive of Brv 



CO years afterwards by Emperor Charley ^^^ 

 a visit to this benefactor's burial place and * 



till the end of the 14th century, when a 

 bant made the discovery, for which he 



1 



r-i 



made 





of our most valuable crops. It is impossible to say 

 how far the general crop may be affected, but it is 

 certain that the loss on particular farms has been 

 very great. It seems that Mr. Bruce, who resides 

 in the south of Ireland, has suffered severely, but can 

 still look forward to a similar visitation with com- 

 parative indifference, as he intends to starve the 

 insects out by pulling up the Swedes as soon as they 

 make their appearance, and then sowing Purple-top 

 Yellow in their place ; but, as he justly observes, 

 this remedy will only be applicable when late sowing 

 can be practised. He relates a curious instance 

 of the devouring scourge eating the Purple- top 

 Turnips at the rate of 11 to 12 yards a day across 

 the drills in a field, where they cleared the ground 

 before them as they issued from the side where 

 Mangold was growing. In this particular case we 

 think that these voracious devourers might have 

 been met on their own ground by their natural 

 enemies with great effect. For our own part we 

 would rather recdtainiend Turnip growers to be pre- 

 pared by next season with an army of very useful 

 and apparently most efficient antagonists, than to 

 deprive the caterpillar of the means of existence, for 

 the first chance of a Turnip crop is always the best 

 one. AVe would advise a trial of the same means 

 which were used by the late Lord Leicester in 1784 

 to clear his Turnip fields of the pert. In the 2d 

 volume of the "-Annals of Agriculture," Arthur 

 Young writes "Mr. Coke having heard that ducks 

 had been used in small patches of Turnips in 

 gardens to eat the caterpillar, called the black 

 canker, determined, on a field of 33 acres of 

 Turnips being attacked by that pernicious animal, 

 to try how far they might be depended upon on a 



& - tf^5 e ^?S Ms bail ? ff to buf all the 





on 



'£ twft^ Presently collected 400; 



the 16th July they were turned into the 33 

 acres, having water at one corner of the field and 

 m five days they cleared the whole most compfetefy 

 marching at last through the field on the hunt? eyeing 

 the leaves on both sides with great care to devonf 

 every one they could see, and filling their cron 

 several times in a day. The ducks havin, S 

 above mi, worth of Turnips, were sent g to the 

 Poultry vards . We should imagine ducks might be 



well adapted for light and chalky soils, owing to their 

 retaining much moisture, on account of which property 

 they are well suited for Hops : cut into pieces, rags can 

 be applied at the rate of 5 to 9 cwt, either to Wheat, 

 Clover, or Turnips ; from their slow fermentive tendency, 

 they should be applied some time previous to sowing a 

 crop, so as to have their fertilising action brought 

 out ; [scatter them over the soil and cover them 

 with the last ploughing, so as the harrows cannot 

 drag them up. Rags are rich in nitrogen, contain- 

 ing more than blood — they contain l-20th of their 

 weight of sulphur. In the United Kingdom the wool 

 crop abstracts from the soil five million pounds of 

 sulphur annually, to restore which to the soil, 13,000 

 tons of gypsum would be required. 



Clippings, or Cony-dust, is a substance procured 

 from the waste particles of wool or far, and mixed up 

 with the clippings of the rabbit skins from off which the 

 fur is taken. It is employed in Lincoln at the rate of 

 18 bushels, in the raising of Turnips on light soils. 

 Like wool, it is deficient in inorganic matter, and its 

 success, as a manure, may be attributed to the nitrogen 

 and animal secretions contained in it. 



Hair is very seldom, almost never, employed in this 

 country as a manure, but it can be purchased at the tan- 

 yards of Belfast for hi. per ton. In China, it is more 

 extensively employed. 



Horn is procured, for agricultural purposes, from the 

 parings of that substance in the manufacture of thin 

 plates for lanthorns when the latter are rendered semi- 

 transparent ; horn being the first transparent substi 

 used for lantherns and windows. It is similar in com- 

 position with wool, and, like it, decays slowly in the soil, 

 in consequence of containing little water — water being a 

 chief agent in promoting decay, probably from the 

 facility with which it yields up its own elements to 

 induce the formation of new compounds. 



Refuse of Sugar Refineries is the skimmings of 

 the sugar during the process of refining, which process 

 is effected by the albumen contained iu the bullock's 

 blood ; a substitute for blood, consisting of gelatinous 

 alumina and gypsum, has of late in this country been 

 employed ; hence, the reason why the refuse charcoal is 

 frequently poor in blood. The refuse should be broken 

 into small lumps, mixed with road scrapings, and ap- 

 plied at the rate of 25 tons to cold adhesive soils. It is 

 largely used in France, its value being estimated in pro- 

 portion to the quantity of blood contained in it. 



Fish, where met within large quantities, is employed 

 as a manure ; its efficacy being equal to the bones or 

 flesh of land animals. Thus the bones of an ox contain 

 64J per cent, of earthy matter, and 851 of gelatine ;* 

 while those of fish contain 67 per cent, of the former 

 and 32 • of the latter. The inorganic matter con- 

 sists of phosphate and carbonate of lime, 

 the amount of nitrogen found in salmon 



ate a herring on his tomb. In the fens of Line lj 

 Cambridge small fish abound in such swarms that tK 

 are netted and sold for manure. Whales killed V 

 northern seas are cut up into large pieces w-^- U l 

 vessel until its return home, when the oil is extradri 

 (train oil it is called) by boiling ; what remains is c £ 

 blubber. ^ The fat of the whale preserves its body fro 

 putrefaction, and shields it from cold. Fish refuw 

 whether obtained from blubber, sprats, the entrails and 

 heads of cod and ling from the curing station should h> 



into layers with old sods, earth, or bog mouli 

 commencing with a layer of earth, two feet in thicknm 

 next a layer of fish, one foot thick, alternating the 

 materials. The compost is thus to remain for two 

 months, when it should be turned, its parts intimate!? 

 mixed ; and at the end of eight months, previously 

 giving the heap two additional turnings, applied at the 

 rate of 27 tons per acre to all crops and all soils. 

 Fish Oil has been recommended as a manure; I 



have as yet seen no satisfactory proofs of its efficacy; 

 nor am I inclined to expect such, seeing that oil is t 

 carbon united with the elements of water. 



Bones.— Nature uses the salts of lime for the frame- 

 work of animals. The use of bones as a manure wis 

 known in England since 1776 ; but it was only within 

 the last 29 years that they were employed extensively. 

 Large quantities were imported into Hull, from 

 continent ; in the former place machinery was erected 

 for their comminution, and the crushed mass sold out to 

 the farmers of York and Lincoln ; and from fte su* 

 cessful application of bones to the Turnip crop, they 

 were gradually looked upon as something more than* 

 manure subsidiary to the farm-yard. Previous to 

 machinery being discovered for reducing bones to a 

 state of comparative fineness, the bones were burned, 

 for the sake of their ash, which was called «boae 

 earth ; " or when burned in close vessels the residue 

 was called animal charcoal or bone black. Byfachof 

 these methods the organic matter was lost. Other 

 times they were mixed with quick-lime, stewedatt* 

 bottom ofMung-pits, and there decomposed v toe 

 ammoniacal salts in the urine. Again we find them 

 broken by hammers, from which, as great *ero*» 

 spring from insignificant causes, may have ledto u» 

 invention of machinery to abridge M»*i •*£ 

 general faith in the efficacy of bones led to greater 

 trials of them for manuring purposes, el 

 taught their immediate action was i greater JJ* 

 plied to the soil in a finely divided state and tf* 

 corroborated the fact. Bones are crushed bj pu* 



experience 



through a series of rollers with deeply i«J^S 

 eacli underlying set having the teeth more d«ri} *»J 

 until the hJh ami half-inch standar a £«£*£ 

 "dit* M is fotffe'il by screening out theiiner w 

 more closely ground particles. Libra.^ 



ON THB CTJLTORE_ OPFARg i 



01 





^profitable £*">££ » *l 



rotted farm-y^ dung •---£ 

 of autumn, and ploughed "nder^ 



deep, rich, warm loam, which may be very u ^ 

 for their use, and for that of all tap-rooted .£* £ 

 operation of subsoil ploughing the ^Mja^r ^ 



the staple. The ro 



stubble in the end 01 »uiuu««,«»- r- -° , d j 3 B o' 

 deep furrow. In the early spring, the m ^ ^ 

 lengthwise and crosswise, by two operations ^ 

 tined grubber, which pulverises the soil, a ^^ 

 weeds to the surface, which are pickea ■ 



removed. The seeds of the Parsnips are t^^ 

 March, on the flat ground, by a ,on iying -J» 

 lengthened coulters, which make ruts ' d b y 



seeds at the distance of 18 incff ^J/lwn 3 «« 



When the plants •» . t0 the 



a bush-harrow. 

 inches hizh. they 



sin 



giei by the *f*?Z2 

 di;unce'of'l foot from ^^^J^*** 



the intervals of the drills are sc« 



ndition 



ton is the same, 12| per cent., while 



Again, 

 and mut- 



that 



in£ 



, . . . , - -. x -, of the 



skate contains lo£, and beef 14. Off the coasts of 

 Cornwall and Devon the pilchard, somewhat resembl 



Wlv Hf Hf M J° th r b0ne8 - ; P h , 0S P hat « «f "me strength 

 ffi the , bone! of an ox U gel»««>e I it •» lately found 

 to the bones of yound animal*, hence, they are more easily 

 broken. The weakness of fish bone* arise* from ™ ? 



gelatine -bones will retain their shape and appearan 



WWfcid Mldjproperly thinned. In ♦ ^ «^ 



crop grows till the time of storing, »1 £* the *i 

 as &J roote are not easily har byj ** deprived^ 

 October, or in November, the roo« ^ . fl ,** 

 hand sickle of the top and hbre_, - ^ pl?s oiij 

 he homestead. The tops are gn en con «rtw 



m yard, where part is eaten, and tue 



not a 



ftn exceif of 



c#, when 



their earthy .alt, are dissolved out by a m^eraT.ci h« Win 



Oil ot vitriol. Gelatine U found in glue, isiorfafB and narrh 

 meat ; and in skins, united with tartaric' aadX&mlntoS; 



ope 



into manure. ;nfl lS w* ~ r * 



For horses, the use of rawnig * ^ 

 swine, the roots are ^^ beneficial, _^ 



or steamed condition ; and for ee^ ^ . (b p ar 



highly 



cattle? 



or steamed conn.tion , ««« - fed iri» - - ^ 



very much re. min.mdod. f "^ t | ia t » "^ 



Shimuch milk, and ^•^**^ 

 flavour*. The Voots .*^ *"*. '» whie h prjj^ 



and mind with chaff in ^ ft W s of *•*£> 

 chaff is impregnated with *•«%!* ^ 

 are expelled by the heat, ^^% pee»W i] 

 lost. This preparation forms a very ■ 









