Vermont watchman and State journal. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1836-1883, 1859-09-16
agricultural.


by FEEDING oUT Us fR0nUCTs AND GIVING BACK
THE MANURE.

THE MANURE.
BY FREDERICK HoLBRooK.
1t appears to me that, generally speaking,
the great aim in farming, here in New Eng
land, should be, to devise and perfect ways
for expending the various products Of the
soil upon the farm, so as to get about as much
for them in the growth OF stock, the meats,
dairy products OF wool, NC. into which they
have been converted, as though they had been
sold off for money; thus giving back to the
land the manures the crops may make. in
creased in quantity, of course, by all judi
cious modes Of composing with them the va
rious unemployed or waste vegetables and
other substances of the farm which contain
the elements Of fertility.
The mistake has been, and still is, too
common, of selling off considerable proper
tion Of the grain crops especially, and con-
verting them into money. II any surplus
were left after paying debts and expenses,
that has generally been invested either in the
purchase Of more land or at interest, or in
stocks and other property outside Of farming.
The farm thus not receiving back a sufficient
compensation for the products it has borne,
has been undergoing a gradual waste of fer
tliiy. and generally has not been as profitable
to the owner as it would have been under
more generous cultivation. Indeed. his in
come, from all sources, is perha~ less than if
he had invested more from year TO wear in
the improy ement of tho soil. looking to
highly cultivated farm for dividends, and less
in merely adding acres. OF in stocks and other
outside property. Cases are not rare of men
who have worked hard. during the best work
ing period of their life, to get enough in
come from their farms, over and above ex-
penses, to make an annual investment of
money at interest, or in some kinds of stocks.
so as to have something. they term it, laid
up for a wet day, or for old age. But the
difficulty is. they have been cxhsusting the
farm by so doing, and as life advances and
they find themselves less able to labor on the
land, the farm is less productive than when
they were young, will not reward labor
formerly, and much hard and discouraging
work must really be done to get tolerabe
return from the investment. They are not so
well situated to live easily and pleasantly in
old age, and, perhaps their income or resour-
ces, all told. are not as good as though larger
investments had from time to time been made
in the improvement of the soil, the farm
growing more and more productive, and re-
quiring less hard labor than formerly, in pro-
portion to the income derived from it.
There may be instances where il is best to
sell off the products of the farm to consid-
erable extent, and purchase town manures
and this course will do, provided enough ma
nure is bought to compensate the land for
bearing those products. But in by far tho
generality of cases the farmer must rely upon
the manure made on his own farm.
The hay and coarse fodder are generally
mostly fed out on the farm, but often the
principal part of the grain is sold off directly
for cash. Now l have the impression that
in the long run, all things considered, it
might be better to feed out the greater part
Of the grain along with the hay and other
forage, aud let the income of the farm be de-
rived mainly from the stock. The grain fed
with the forage adds peculiar essence of
strength and activity to the manure heap, is
emphatically " the leaven which leavens the
whole lamp and has very marked intiu-
enee IN Increasing the products of the farm
generally. The land will be more productive
in every kind of crop than if the grain were
sold off, and it only got back the colder and
less fertllizing manure made simply from hay
and coarse forage.
After few years of this kind of feeding,
the products Of the farm will be so much
increased that considerable more stock can
be kept on it, which will, in turn, make more
manure for the land. These influences will
work back and forth ono upon the other, so
that in fact the business will grow more and
more profitable, and the investment will in
crease more and more in proportion that it
will be necessary to increase the investment.
There are hardly any limits to the productive
capacity of our farms, if we will only study
out ways of expending our crops judiciously,
and making tho most of the manures they
Will return to the soil. Sections of country
may be pointed out in Europe, not naturally
more favored for soil and climate than our
own, where the land has been cultivated for
hundreds Of years, and IL now more produc-