CARTER AND CO.’S GARDENER’S YADE MEOUM FOR 1862. 
96 
fly from it or which flow from it ; and the distinct and 
definite idea that so much matter has gone by mismanage- 
ment, which if built into the plants would have added to 
their weight, is one which it is well to have fixed in the 
mind. The loss of so-called quality might be borne under 
the idea that by skilful management its lost character 
might bo restored : the loss of so much quantity is abso- 
lute and irreparable ; as entire as if the money value of 
the quantity in question had been thrown into the sea. 
The waste to which farmyard dung is liable arises chiefly 
out of the mode of its manufacture. For the sake of ob- 
taining the dung in a condition in which it contains ready- 
made the food of plants, and in which it may be easily 
mixed with the soil, it is fermented in large heaps, and these 
are generally open to the air and rain. The conseqiience 
is, that the products of the fermentation which ensues 
escape into the air or are washed out into the ditch, and in 
either case are lost to the farmer. The remedy is either to 
plough the manure under as soon as made, i. c. as soon as 
the litter is used and soiled, or to gather it in heaps from 
day to day as made, placing it on a layer of absorbent 
earth, and covering it with a layer of earth in a ridge-form, 
which shall shed the rain and suck up all exhalations. 
Dr. Voelcker tells us indeed that it is much more by the 
washing of rain-water than by the escape of the gaseous 
products of fermentation that manure suffers loss, and 
that no better plan exists of applying dung to the land 
than spreading it over the surface as soon as made, whe- 
ther it bo ploughed under at onco or not. When freshly 
made it contains but little matter capable of loss by ex- 
posure, or by washing, but tin's loss becomes possible and 
actual as it rots in heaps together. The inference as to top- 
dressing of recent manure during the winter months, to bo 
ploughed under as the weather permits, before spring 
time, is one which ought to be fully tested in the field. 
The use of an absorbent and disinfectant substance 
which shall fix the volatile products of fermentation and 
at the same t ; • hinder the fouling of the air of our stables 
and feeding-nonces, would be almost done away 'with, if 
the practice should prevail of ploughing in or apply- 
ing dung as soon as made ; nevertheless for a long time to 
come, indeed always as regards a considerable portion of 
the manure of the farm, duug will be rotted in heaps, and 
the means of retaining and fixing the products of its fer- 
mentation will be used. Earth covering the heap is an 
efficient strong box for the vapour of a rotting dung-heap. 
Charooal, which has been highly spoken of for this use, is a 
good disinfectant ; but this is by oxidizing, which means 
burning up the emanations which we wish to retain. To 
cover the dung-heap with charcoal would indeed remove 
all smell, but this it would do by destroying or converting 
into substances unavailable for plants the things we wish 
to use. Gypsum is good as a manure in itself, but com- 
paratively inefficient as a fixer of ammonia, owing to its 
comparative insolubility. Chloride of zinc (Sir W. Bur- 
nett's disinfectant) is costly and poisonous. Sulphate of 
iron would be a good fixer of ammonia, owing to the 
sulphuric acid it supplies, but its iron would convert the 
phosphates into an insoluble and useless salt. Common 
salt has some powers as a fixer of ammonia, but these de- 
pend upon affinities so nearly balanced as to render them 
neither permanent nor long-lived. Sulphuric acid would 
indeed be n good fixer of ammonia, but it is entirely un- 
fitted, by its corrosive properties, for use near animals. 
Mr. M‘Dougall of Manchester suggests the alkaline or 
lime salts of carbolic acid, a product of the distillation 
of coal, as an efficient and harmless fixer of ammonia, 
and disinfectant, and there exist testimonials in its 
favour. As to the quantity of farm manure possible 
on a farm, the following data may assist an estimate. 
On Whitfield farm, Gloucestershire (150 acres of 
grain crop, 30 acres of clover, and GO acres of green 
crop), upwards ot 2000 cubic yards of manure were made 
annually, or probably about 1200 or 1300 tons, and this 
would represent 1 ton of straw as making about 4 tons 
of dung. This w r as when large quantities of green crops 
were grown, probably 1000 to 1200 tons of roots each 
year. Again, as so many separate facts bearing on this 
question, it may be added (1 ) that an ox fed on green food 
and hay and straw will yield about one cwh of excrement, 
liquid and solid, daily. Mr. Haxton, in the * Cyclopaedia 
of Agriculture,’ calculates that a stall-fed ox will yield of 
solid dung during— tons owl, qrs. lbs. 
210 days 55 lbs. a day 5 3 0 24 
155 days 41 lbs. a day 2 17 1 20 
Add litter 14 lbs. a day 2 5 2 14 
Urine absorbed by litter 22 £ lbs 3 13 1 8 
In all, per annum 13 19 2 10 
But besides this a lot of urine runs to waste, making 
altogether probably about 20 tons per ox, stall-fed, 
throughout the year. If the ox be stall-fed rather more 
litter is needed, and all the urine is absorbed by it, so that 
the quantity is not only greater, but its quality is better. 
On this point Dr. Voelcker’ s figures may be quoted. He 
found box manure to contain 71 per cent, of water, and 
nitrogen equal to 2*37 per cent, of ammonia, when yard 
manure contained 1*4 per cent, of nitrogen, equal to 17 of 
ammonia. Box manure contained also -3 per cent., one 
half more, of phosphoric acid and 2 per cent, of potash 
and soda — more than twice as much as farmyard dung. 
(2) The horse voids about 30 lbs. weight of dung daily. 
It loses more by perspiration, and is generally fed on drier 
food than the ox, so that there is less urine and the dung 
is drier. Mr. Haxton calculates its annual yield at about. 
1 1 tons : — Much however of it is wasted on the roads when 
it is out at work. (3) Of pigs and sheep it may be esti- 
mated that eight or ten make as much manure as a full- 
grown ox, consuming as they do about the same quantity 
of food. (4) If’ 600 acres be cultivated on a six-field 
system, it may be supposed to yield per annum 600 tons 
of dry fodder and litter, and 2500 tons of green and suc- 
culent food ; and the produce of manure may bo estimated 
thus: — The winter food will keep 120 beasts or 1000 sheep, 
yielding 1600 tons of farm dung during the winter months. 
The summer stall feeding and the stable may be expected 
to yield other 400 tons, or 2000 tons in all. How much 
this may be reduced in quantity and how much in quality 
by mismanagement, Dr. Voelcker has shown in his illus- 
tration of the superiority of winter top dressings and the 
application of fresh-made manure or of box feeding, and ma- 
nure-making under cover, over the ordinary method of 
treating straw down in yards, and afterwards “ making ” 
the dung in exposed and rapidly fermenting heaps. 
3. Of Artificial Manures : — The use of these ns auxiliaries 
even in the case of farms, where the yard and box dung is 
well managed and enriched by the consumption of large 
quantities of purchased cattle food, is now an almost 
universal practice. Guano, 2 or 3 cwt. per acre, ap- 
plied to grain crops, root crops, and grass lands. Bones 
and sulphuric acid or superphosphate of lime, applied to 
Turnips, Swedes, Mangold Wurzel, at the rate of 3 or 4 
cwt. per acre, and in smaller proportion with good ef- 
fect to late-sown barley. Sulphate of ammonia and ni- 
trate of soda, 1 £ or 2 cwts. per acre, applied to grain crops 
and grasses. Common salt 2 or 3 cwt. per acre, applied to 
grain crops on straw-growing soils, also to Mangold 
Wurzel : these are among the most important and generally 
used. As to the period of applying them, the rule would 
be to put the very soluble salts to the land when the plants 
arc actually growing, and therefore ready at once to take 
them up ; thus ammoniacal and soda salts should be put on 
in wet weather, during April, on the growing wheat. 
Bone-dust may be applied in Autumn on pastures, and 
any time before seed-time for turnips. Superphosphate 
or Guano may be well mixed with the soil just at the time 
of sowing the seed. 
It is now the fashion to look upon ammonia and phos- 
phoric acid as the essential elements of manure. Their 
special importance, however, arises out of their being the 
elements generally present in the least quantity in the 
