THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



247 



It has been ascertained that guano measura- 

 bly fails in a drought, and that it should be ap- 

 plied during or preceding showery weather. Its 

 chief virtue is derived from the urate of ammo- 

 nia which it contained. When brought in con- 

 tact with lime the ammonia is liberated in a 

 gaseous form, and is lost in the air. No such 

 result ensues from a union with plaster; indeed 

 it is recommended by some to mix plaster or 

 charcoal with it. Perhaps as good a mode as 

 any other is to mix the guano with two or three 

 times its own bulk of line loam, and sow it 

 evenly over the land. As to the quantity re- 

 quired, from two to four hundred weight should 

 be applied to grass lands — for turnips and upon 

 poor land, to produce a permanent effect, from 

 five to seven hundred weight should be applied. 

 The guano should never be permitted to come 

 in contact with the seed : it is too exciting, and 

 burns the tender germ — it is best to divide it, 

 and sow at different times — first, when the plant 

 is fairly started, and then about the period of 

 flowering. At periods, says Dr. Gardner, when 

 the attacks of injurious insects are apprehended, 

 (rust would probably come under the same cate- 

 gory,) a new application may do much good, 

 by giving the plants sufficient growth to resist 

 the injuries. When applied, says the same au- 

 thority, to corn or tobacco, it should be well 

 worked into the land. On tobacco, it may be 

 added when transplanted and at the topping 

 season. We will add, that it would undoubted- 

 ly prove a great auxiliary to the plant bed. 



One of the greatest difficulties the farmer will 

 have to encounter in the use of guano, is the 

 liability to imposition as to the purity and qua- 

 lity of the article. In the first place, there are 

 different varieties differing very much in their 

 composition and qualities — secondly, exposure 

 to air and moisture lessens materially the value 

 of the article, and thirdly, it is liable to be dis- 

 honestly adulterated. For a test of purity we 

 quote again from Dr. Gardner's essay : 



1st. Provide a balance sufficiently delicate to 

 turn with a seed — that used for prescriptions 

 will answer if exact. 



2d. Reduce about a tea-spoonful of guano to 

 fine powder. 



3d. Weigh ten grains of the powder, freed 

 from any adventitious leaves, feathers, or other 

 impurities ; spread on a piece of paper, and ex- 

 pose to the sun upon a stove or other warm 

 place, not exceeding two hundred and twelve 



degrees Fahrenheit, until perfectly dry. Re- 

 weigh, to estimate the loss of water, which 

 should not exceed twenty-five per cent. 



4th. Place the dried powder on a strip of 

 platinum, and heat over a spirit flame to a full 

 red heat. As the guano warms, it begins to 

 exhale the smell of ammonia, turns black, and 

 if oxalate of ammonia be present to any extent, 

 throws up a dense white smoke of oxamide, 

 which is a certain sign of the oxalate. The 

 heat must be continued until the blackness is 

 entirely gone. Upon cooling, the remainder is 

 weighed and the loss marks the amount of vo- 

 latile matter. A good specimen should yield 

 forty per cent. By this means all the ammonia 

 is driven off, with oxalic, uric and humic acids, 

 as well as carbonic and muriatic acids, in com- 

 bination with ammonia. The only objection to 

 the process arises from vegetable and animal 

 impurities, which must always be separated be- 

 fore-hand by reducing the guano into a very 

 fine dust, and picking or sifting out every parti- 

 cle which is not easily crushed. The method 

 is applicable to every variety of guano, and 

 knowing the peculiarities given, leads us to cor- 

 rect estimates of the value of a specimen. 



The manure is partly in the state of a dark 

 powder, and partly in lumps. The latter are 

 less decayed than the powder, and are, there- 

 fore, a test of the goodness of a specimen, which 

 should be very coarse and full of lumps. 



CURING GREEN CORN-STALKS. 



The difficulty which has sometimes attended 

 the curing of corn-fodder, has been considered 

 quite a drawback to the advantages of sowing 

 corn for winter feed. In curing hay from grass f 

 we prefer the siueating mode, as it is called, 

 having practiced it with success. We have 

 never tried this mode for green corn, but a writer 

 (F. M. Butler) in the New York Farmer and 

 Mechanic says he has practiced it with corn to 

 as good advantage as with grass. He recom- 

 mends to cut the green corn and let it lay in the 

 swarth to dry off the dews or moisture and to 

 become a little heated. As soon as this is done, 

 put it up in large cocks or rather into shocks, 

 trample it down close ; let it remain in the 

 shocks until it wilts and sweats or ripens, then 

 dry off the sweat and remove the fodder to your 

 barn. He says, "I remember a lot of green 

 corn which for ten days baffled the skill of the 

 farmer to cure it, and which was finally handed 

 over to my care as being incurable. Feeling a 

 firm reliance in the principles that should govern 

 the curing of succulent vegetation for fodder, I 



