Burlington free press. [volume] (Burlington, Vt.) 1827-1865, 1844-03-08
ID A N AS
PRIZE ESSAY ON MANURE.
SECTION SEVENTH.

W the Circumstances lChich affect The QudLuy
and Quantity IF Animal Dung.
That we may reduce to some general princi-
pie, easily understood and easily remembered,
the facts scattered up and down among the mass
of writers and observers about the different quail
ity of manure afforded BY different animals, or
the same animals at different times, let me,
reader, request your company while walk into
a new department Of your chemistry. You may
not understand the reasons of this difference in
manures; why, for instance, fattening cattle
give stronger manure than working oxen, with
out going little into the mode how animals are
nourished. The whole may be stated in plain
terms thus All food serves two purposes
The first is TO keep up the animal heat, and this
part Of food disappears in breathing or in form
ing fat; that is, after serving its purpose in the
animal body, it goes off in the breath of sweat,
or it forms fat. 1t is SO essential to the action
of breathing, that we will term it food for
breathing, or the breathers The second pur-
pose answered by food is, to build up, sustain,
and renew the waste of the body.
Now all this is done from the blood. To
form blood, animals must be supplied with its
materials ready formed. They ready formed
in plants; and animals never do form the mate
rails for making blood. We may therefore term
this kind of food the blood formers. We have
then two classes of food the breathers and the
fat formers and the blood formers. If we look
to the nature of these different classes, we find
that sugar, starch and gum are breathers. Now
there are three prime Piles found in plants exactly
and identically the same in chemical compost
ton with white of egg, flesh, and curd of milk.
Now these three principles exactly alike, wheth-
er derived from animals or from plants, are the
only blood formers. shall not, reader tax your
attention further upon this subject, than to beg
you to remember these important facts First,
all food for breathing and forming fat, contains
only these three eements-oxygen, hydrogen,
and carbon. Secondly, all food for forming
flesh and bood, in addition to these contains nj
troGen
This is the gst of the whole matter, so far as
relates to manure. Bear in mind as you go on
with me, reader, this fact, that all the food ami
mails take, that alone can form flesh and blood,
contains nitrogen. The door is now open for
explaining why age, sex, kind Of employment,
difference of food difference of ANIMAL can and
do produce marked difference in the value of
dIfftrant manures. And first, let US consider
how the quantity is affected. This depends on
the kind of food The analysis of cattle dung
which has been given, is that Of cows fed on
hay, that is, herds grass. red-top, SC Cor what
is usually termed English hayD potatoes and
water: the cattle kept up the year round An
animal so treated, consumed in seven days
Water, Gil lbs.
Potatoes, az
Hay, I67 &
During TINS time she dropped clear dung o99 lbs,
or very nearly bushel of dung day. Every
attention was here paid to accuracy Of measure
ment and weight. The annual amount of dung
from COW exceeds, by this account, that
which is usually assigned. But, as it is mat
ter of some Importance for the farmer to estimate
what the produce of his stock may be in dung,
the following statement, containing the results
of large establishment, will probably give that
average.
At this establishment the cows were kept up
the, year round for their dung. 1t was collected
for use from litter, and measured daily into large
tubs of known capacity. The average number
Of cows kept was fifty -four for nine and half
years. During that time, they consumed of
beets, meal, and pumpkins, brewery grains,
cornstalks, turnips, potatoes, and cabbages,
942, 436 lbs. giving an average OF green fodder
for each COW per year, ,537 lbs. Average con.
sumption of hay for each cow per annum, s,l6i
lbs. The total dung for nine and a half years
was l20,520 bushels, or per COW per annun, 235
bushels This g ives daily consumption of
green food, 3 lbs, and % lbs. of hay per COW,
and two and half pecks of dung per day, or
about 56 lbs, per COW.
But according to some experiments made to
determine how much the quality of the food af
fected the quantity Of dung, it appears that the
solid and fluid excrements partially dried, were,
compared with the food, as follows: