THE CHEAPEST MANURE.

Oamaru Mail, Volume IV, Issue 1033, 12 August 1879, Page 2 (Supplement)

THE CHEAPEST MANURE.

( Albany Cultivator.)

The great secret of making money from land is to keep it constantly in a high condition. The man who raises twenty-five bushels of Indian corn per acre from his ten acre lot at an expense which is barely paid by the sale of the crop, receives immeasurably less profit than if he raised, fifty bushels per aero with the same labor of ploughing, hoeing, &c. It often happens that the poorer land costs th& most to cultivate and to keep, clean. These points are well understood and. admitted, but the great secret to which we allude is less so —or at least is far .less carried out in practice. This is to keep the land at all times in the highest condition. Too often farmers enrich a field, and then exhaust it in their eager desiro to obtain speedy profits. It is like feeding a horse till he is in fine condition, and then working him down to a skeleton in order to obtain a large amount of cheap labor from him ; or like giving high feeding to growing animals at intervals, and starving them at other times. Every good manager knows that all animals are moro easily and cheaply kept in good order by uniform treatment than by alternately building up and running down, and those which are growing will grow ten times asfast under the former system. It is just, so in managing farms. If they are in poor condition, improve them by a continued and uniform system of renovation j if already rich, keep them so by the same, uniform course. The question occurs, what is the be3b way to increase fertility ? And what is. the cheapest manure 1 A book might be written on the subject : we shall only sketch an outline in a few brief hints. Away from towns and cities, and under ordinary circumstances, the cheapest manure is the red clover plant. The most economical expenditure is not for guano,, nor for superphosphate, but for cloverseed. In passing through the newer, as well as the less improved, States, any observing farmer will perceive that the great deficiency is the want of clover. One good crop turned under is equal to one heavy manuring. The cost of seed for an acre neeel not exceed three dollars ; the labor and expense in sowing and raising in a good rotation, and with other crops, is comparatively small—far less than carting, spread l ng and properly applying a heavy coating of manure, with its price added. Manure should incleud be carefully saved and properly applied, for tho fanner needs every help of the, kind. But to enrich five hundred aorea, witii only enough manure for twenty, i& impossible. There is a limit to the amount, of manure, but no limit to the mode of enriching by ploughing in clover. 100 or 200 or 300 acres may be sown if necessary ; plaster (apply gypsum) it after harvest, or in autumn, and again the next spring. If manure is the sole objeot, turn under a heavy crop the first year. If, as nearly always happens, hay or pasture are desirable, plough the second year. In one respect, no difficulty occurs, nor special okill is required ; but, whenever a heavy crop of tht; clover goes under, the soil cannot fail to bo enriched. .Next in importance to clover, is yard manure. Good management will produce double, triple, or quadruple the amount obtained under neglect See that none is wasted. Let it all be absorbed by a sufficient, uniform and regular application of straw litter. If straw is abundant, apply it moro freely but not irregularly—so that it may be evenly diffused with the manure. Throw it up in heaps, and exposure to the weather will more speedily rot it down, If this is done in spring, trim off the *trawy outsides with a hay-knife by midsummer, and throw the trimmings up into the middle. These heaps will do to apply as a top-dressing in autumn to wheat field?, after ploughing and before sowing, or to clover or other gra-ss land intended for ploughing the succeeding spring for corn —the best and cheapest way to obtain large crops. The earlier the manure ia applied to the grass in autumn the better, and it is worth double or triple the value obtained from it, if left to be applied to corn ground in spring. If litter can only be obtained in small quantities, it should be carefully kept in heaps under shelter, to prevent washing away by rains. In addition to yard manure, the careful farmer will save many other substances to cast into the manure heap, which will be useful auxiliaries, but they cannot go very far towards fertilising a farm. The main dependence, we again repeat, must be, first on clover, aud secondly on yard manure.

A few words as to the best rotation for an enriching system. The one which brings in a grain crop most frequently, admitting the land may be seeded down to clover, every crop of which is to be ploughed under when in heavy growth, . will be the best. But to prevent the ir IJ crease of weeds, hoed crops must hi 1 their place, and thorough and repe" , / v use of the cultivator employed to cradiftaw' permanent weeds. At the North, » favorite rotation is, first, corn on inverted clover sod, top-dressod with manure the previous autumn. Secondly, barley, oats, peas, or any spring crop which can be taken off early enough for sowing wheat. If wheat follows oats, manure is applied) unless the land is previously quite rich. Some pursue the practice of sowiug a moderate amount of timothy sued or herd's grass, at the time the wheat is sown ! others, deeming this injurious to the wheat by the early start which the grass thus receives, and its rank growth among the wheat the following season, when on strong soils, prefer to sow the tinw about three weeks later. Early the ' ing spring clover seed is applied at rate of a peck per acre, and the lan allowed to remain as meadow the n< * • year, and pastured'the following, V viously to breaking up again for <»: • This course gives ouly one manuring inverted cloyer in five years ; and it D a

to plough it tmder m spring, the a4C0 f tiHnefifi > 8 " on ® tllo ' are 0 , Muboth, aa an enrichcr and »loosener 'compact soils- TO' 3 c,,rlTSl * ®? a y b ® itKud by sow ins? tfin clover with the ■Jr or thinly seeded oato the second if wo SOW the outa at the rate of ffT bnshet per amv the clover seed 01 Vt* always takes well if two or three """Lfo are sown. tfi* clover is often 11118 theri'd. This clover may be ploughed ""IL first or second year foltowing, wfierv ' full <'rowth, and wheal" sown on the ~h.iH"d to be again seeded down to nivci"-' 1 ■

Tilt' management hen; pointed out will . familiar to many of our readers : but »iiere are riew subscribers—young in I'biii.ines.! -and. M»e those who have those ri marks, possessing com"irtitively little experience, we trust they ][ prove useful, nnd we hope they will '"] l out from accurate cultivators the reof their experiment* on these dif\.rent points-