1896 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER 
8i5 
HOW MANURE IS HANDLED IN WINTER. 
PRACTICES IN VARIOUS PARTS OF THE LAND. 
What is the usual method of handling manure in your locality ? 
What are the reasons given for the local practices ? What sys¬ 
tem seems to give the best results ? From your experience and 
with your soil, what would you do with this winter’s supply of 
manure, if you could have things arranged exactly to suit you ? 
Purchased Manure on a Fruit Farm. 
Circumstances vary so much, that no uniform prac¬ 
tice for handling manure during the winter months 
can be adopted. Different crops grown, quality of 
soil, face of the ground, whether hilly or level, and 
condition of roads, are all factors to be taken into 
consideration when planning for taking care of the 
manure that accumulates during the winter. On 
dairy farms, or where milk is the chief product, the 
manure is generally applied to the soil as fast as it is 
made. The next season’s crop, whether corn or grass, 
will doubtless receive a maximum benefit from 
manure applied during the fall and winter. The 
reasons for this are obvious ; all the fertilizing 
elements are applied without extra work in handling, 
and the soil receives the full benefit. 
On our hilly lands, where fruit is the main crop, 
many other things must be taken into account when 
considering the economical application of manure. 
During the season of growth and cropping, it is 
impossible to apply stable manure to the fields. If 
the supply be continuous, some plan for holding it 
with as little waste as possible must be adopted. As 
we gather from three to four tons of stable manure a 
week, I will briefly give our method of caring for it. 
As drawn home, it is put in a pile near where it is to 
be used, and about a peck of kainit is spread over 
each load. By this a double result is sought. The 
chloride of sodium (common salt), as it dissolves, 
attracts moisture from the atmosphere and checks 
rapid fermentation, thus preventing drying and fire- 
fanging. The potash contained in the kainit adds a 
needed element for fruit to the manure. After the 
season of growth, this manure is applied late in the 
fall to grape vines, currant and gooseberry bushes, 
and covered with earth by a shallow plowing. 
A large portion of the manure collected, is used for 
mulching strawberries ; that which has been on hand 
but a short time and is but partly rotted, is saved for 
this purpose. It is not applied until the ground is 
frozen so that it will bear a loaded wagon. This is 
our practice, but some very successful strawberry 
growers cover the beds before the ground freezes. 
Their theory is that the light freezings and thawings 
in the fall heave the ground, destroy many of the 
fibrous roots of the plants, and injure them perma¬ 
nently. This they argue is prevented by mulching 
early with stable manure. We have considered the 
matter carefully, and do not think that the facts in 
most cases warrant the conclusion. Strawberry 
plants set in the spring, under favorable circum¬ 
stances, form a matted row that covers the ground 
thickly with foliage. Beds planted the year previous, 
have a still heavier coat of leaves that cover the 
ground. This 
covering prevents 
the ground freez¬ 
ing in the row 
till steady cold 
weather sets in, 
or until the frost 
of the previous 
night is not 
thawed during 
the day. Thin, 
feeble beds, or 
plants set during 
August or later 
in the season, 
have not enough 
foliage to keep 
the ground from 
freezing around 
them early in the 
fall, and would, 
no doubt, be bene¬ 
fited by an early 
covering. A large part of the manure used by the fruit 
growers in the Hudson River Valley, is brought from 
New York by cars or barges. This is classed as rotten 
or fresh manure. Most growers purchase some of each. 
It is generally applied as soon as received, to grapes, 
and plowed under. The fresh manure is used for 
mulching strawberries. Not as much stable manure 
is used as formerly. Commercial fertilizers are being 
applied more largely each season. For winter pres¬ 
ervation of manure on a fruit farm, there seems no 
better way than to pile it as near as possible to where 
it is to be applied. Horse and cow manure should 
be mixed or placed in alternate layers. If piled snugly, 
there will be but little waste. 
Low prices of farm products emphasize the neces¬ 
sity of economy in labor, as well as in outlay in every 
item of production. A water-tight floor for the ma¬ 
nure heap, with a cistern for the drainage, or a cov¬ 
ered manure shed, would, doubtless, tend to save 
some fertilizing material. By using kainit or salt on 
the fresh manure as it is piled, and placing in snug 
piles, it seems doubtful whether the waste that ensues 
would pay for the investment required to build a shed 
or a waterproof floor and cistern. w. D. barns. 
Orange County, N. Y. 
An Ideal Scheme for Iowa. 
I am happy to say that it is the almost general prac¬ 
tice among my neighbors to save all the manure, and 
the practice is just as well established of scattering it 
on the corn ground in the spring and plowing it 
under. A few throw the manure out under the eaves, 
some wheelbarrow it to a pile away from the barn, 
some who have only a little stock carry it on the fork 
A NEW PLAN FOR IRRIGATING GARDENS. Flo. 267. 
or scoop clear of the barn, and one man, at least, a 
Short-horn breeder, throws the manure into a small 
sled, or box with runners on, which is hauled by one 
horse and is dumped in a big heap eight or ten rods 
from the barn, there to lie till it is carted out in the 
spring. Manure spreaders are used on some farms ; 
probably there are half a dozen in the township. I 
do not know of a manure shed or covered barnyard in 
the county. Of course, where cattle are fed outdoors 
or in open sheds, which is done considerably, the 
manure is not touched until it is time to haul it to the 
fields. 
Nobody composts manure or uses it as top-dressing. 
This refers to the farmers, and not to the gardeners 
around town. Some of the farmers think enough of 
manure to haul it from town, where it can be got for 
the asking. Here is another scheme which is advo¬ 
cated by one of our agricultural papers, but I do not 
happen to know of any one who practices it. It is to 
throw the manure each morning as the stables are 
cleaned into a wagon that stands handy, and when 
the wagon is full take it to the field where needed. 
A FORCING HOUSE WITH SASH ROOF. Fig. 268. 
There are several evident objections to that, but the 
principle one is that it would waste the undigested 
kernels of corn, which make prime hog food. 
I am very well satisfied with the system that de¬ 
posits the manure in a pile clear of the barn, where 
the hogs can work it over, and then hauls it out in 
the spring. The objection to this is that it requires 
the manure to be handled twice. The loss occasioned 
by leaching or evaporation is not worth considering, 
or at least, is not great enough to pay to prevent it. 
Of course surface water should not run to the heap, 
and the pile should be cleared up at least every six 
months. Some of my eastern friends may not agree 
with me about the harm in exposing manure, but here 
are two things entering into this problem that have 
helped to bring me to that conclusion: First, the 
Illinois Experiment Station, after repeated field trials, 
came to the conclusion that, on good prairie soil, 
stable manure applied to corn ground paid only a 
very small profit over the cost of hauling it out. Our 
soil here is practically the same as the prairie soil of 
Illinois, and figuring on a money basis, we must not 
put extra work or expense on the manure, or we shall 
lose that profit. How much corn will a load of fresh 
manure produce ? And when manure is fresh, it is in 
its prime. After we have taken pay out of that for 
handling the manure, how much lumber will it buy ? 
A neighbor is hauling corn past our house to get 
lumber to build cribs for the rest of his crop ; he ex¬ 
changes 100 bushels of corn for 1,000 feet of lumber. 
So we see that the margin is very narrow, and I can 
not see any profit in giving protection to manure. 
All that is left for us to do is to get it to the fields as 
fresh as possible. Second, my observation and experi¬ 
ence with clover (Medium) lead me to think that there 
is an easier and cheaper way to restore lost produc¬ 
tiveness. Not that I value manure any the less, but 
I value clover more. Our next step forward must be 
to save the liquid manure, a large part of which is 
now wasted. 
Personally, the manure problem has given me 
many weary hours of study and planning to arrange 
ideal schemes to fit my farm, and then more weary 
hours of backache in working out these schemes. My 
ideal now is about as follows : Cement floors in all 
the stables to save all the manure ; plenty of bedding 
and litter to absorb the liquid portion ; a heap about 
30 feet from the barn and on ground four or five feet 
lower; a low, tight fence around three sides of the 
heap, so that the hogs will not scatter the manure too 
far, leaving the side next the barn open ; back of the 
cows, have a track similar to a hay-carrier track, and 
to the carrier that runs on this track have a car at¬ 
tached, which car will have a hinged bottom that 
may be unlatched so that it will drop down when a 
rope that reaches back to the barn is pulled, which 
will be, of course, when the heap is reached. Some 
arrangement would need to be made for raising and 
lowering the car for convenience in filling. Then, if 
the track, as soon as it left the stable, had a down¬ 
ward slope, the car would run itself, and when it 
reached the heap it would be unloaded and brought 
back by the rope. The manure from the horse stables 
should bb carried out the same way and to the same 
heap, to be worked over and mixed with the cow ma¬ 
nure by some Duroc-Jersey bogs. In the spring, a 
good, willing hired man should move the manure out, 
while I sat in the house writing about it to The R. 
N.-Y. Pat should put the manure on ground intended 
for corn, or, possibly, potatoes, never on grass or 
where small grain is going in. Again, after harvest, 
the heap would be cleared up and go to the oat stubble, 
and again some time during the fall. 
Iowa. E. B. WATSON. 
Practice of a New York Dairyman. 
In the last two years, a large number of silos have 
been built in this county. The amount of corn raised 
for fodder and en¬ 
silage is, prob¬ 
ably, four times 
as great as it was 
five years ago. 
Other conditions 
being favorable, 
excellent corn 
can be grown on 
clover sod ma¬ 
nured during the 
winter and care¬ 
fully prepared for 
t he crop in spring. 
Modern dairy 
barns are so con¬ 
structed that a 
team can be used 
in cleaning the 
stable. With a 
water-tight gut¬ 
ter and suitable 
litter, all the 
manure can be saved. If it is drawn directly to 
the field and spread on a clover sod, there will be 
no loss of fertilizing material ; if spread on snow, 
very little loss will occur on level fields. A farmer is 
supposed to know the conditions of his own farm and, 
of course, he will not spread manure where milting 
snow will be likely to develop a strong current of 
water. This method of applying manure insures a 
good corn crop. There is very little loss of fertilizing 
material. It saves the labor of piling the manure in 
the yard or field, and subsequently reloading it. A 
large part of the work is done in winter, in a time of 
comparative leisure. All the manure can, in this 
way, be put to profitable use the same year in which 
it is made. WheD the cattle are kept in the stable 
all the time, it is quite practicable to have the barnyard 
“BOXES AT REST.” COLD FRAMES IN SUMMER. Fig. 269. 
