Edgefield advertiser. [volume] (Edgefield, S.C.) 1836-current, 1868-08-05
Home Made and Commercial Ma

ness of saving all the manure possible on
the farm, basing that belief upon expert
ence in various parts Of the world, and
upon calculations of the cost of farm
ward manure as contrasted with that of
other kinds. The problem is perfectly
simple one-with 500 in hand, TO be in
vested in manures. shall the farmer en-
pend it in commercial fertilizers, or in
the labor and appliances necessary to
make barnyard manure? The quantity
of what is ordinarily termed good ma
-nure, that can be made on farm, is de-
pendent, of course, upon the number of
animals and the supply of food for them.
To certain point, then, on each farm, as
determined by the above conditions, it is
profitable to expend money for manure
making-beyond that point it would not
be. If it required just 500 to reach
this limit, on any farm, we should not,
for moment, hesitate to spend it in ma
king barnyard manure, in preference to
buying guano, &c. But suppose the
amount of manure made, is inadequate to
bring the farmers lands up to the degree
of fertility desired. By devoting a lar
ger number of acres to forage plants and
pastures, he might increase his stock and
thus increase manure-and' by spreading
the ashes derived from wood grown on
another portion of the farm devoted to
forest, he might, for while, on the prin-
ciple of robbing Peter to pay Paul, keep
up and even increase the fertility of the
cultivated portion. But, as certain ele
ments of crops are continually removed
from and therefore lost to the farm, by
sale of produce and by excrement dropped
on roads, &c., &C., it is obvious that, un-
less the soil is inexhaustibly rich, the an
nual loss, alluded to above, will finally
exhaust and impoverish the farm-the
time varying with the original fertility of
the soil, and the greater or smaller guam
tity of land devoted to pasture and forest.
In other words, supposing all the eycre-
ments of every kind, solid or liquid,
which possibly. could be saved, and the
straw, &C., returned back to the land,
still there would be constant depletion
arising from the elements taken away in
the crops sold-greater in the case of
some crops than others, in wheat for in
stance. than in cotton. As general
proposition, therefore, it is true that
farmer cannot for an indefinite period of
time. maintain, much less increase, the
original fertility of the soil by home
made .manurcs, unless, as in the case of
the Chinese, there is no export of pro-
duce to foreign countries, and all the ex-
crements, from food, furnished to city
populations from the country, is sent back
again to the farm. The waste of fertili-
ziag substances is, at present, and proper
Iy too, attracting much more attention
than it formerly did. Our readers are
probable aware that the distinguished
chemist. Liebig, is, at present, engaged in
experimenting the saving and prepara-
ton of manure, from the sewers of Lon
don. Until, however, the Chinese system
is fully carried ont, in this country, and
the export of products is stopped, or off
set by the import of foreign products con-
tanning an equivalent amount of ftertilizing
ingredients, all the home made manure,
that we can possibly maAe, will not pre-
vent an annual decrease in the fertility of
our lands, unless restored, by the pro-
ducts of the ocean, in some form orother.
One spot may be made and kept rich at
the expense of others, as in the neighbor-
hood. of cities, where the food of man
and beast is drawn from the area of a
circle of ten or more miles in diameter,
and the excrement derived from said food,
is applied to the land. in circle whose
area is two or three miles-but what one
gains another loses. The fact that con.
fronts us, more Immediately at preser,
is that, in the larger portions of our South
ern country, the lands are already poor
us general thing, too poor to reward the
farmer for the expense Of cultivation; too
poor to raise enoug h grain and forage to
enable the farmer to keep the stock ne
cessary to make large quantities Of farm
yard manure. We admit, fully, that the
absence of grasses, clover, &C., in our ro-
tations, has reduced the amount of stock
and consequently. the amount of home
made manure, below the proper point,
but, after making allowance for this, the
great truth still remains, that land, which
is already poor, cannot be made rich by
manuring it with all the excrements of
man and beast, fed upon the-products of
hat land. To use homely, but express
sive phrase, the case is that of the man
who attempts to lift himself up by his
boots-he may pull up one foot, out both
will not come So the farmer, when his
surface soil is exhausted, may, by deep
rooted plants. like clover, &C., bring up
elements from the subsoil aud place them
near the surface, and thus apparently re-
store its fertility, but, if this is repeated,
the subsoil soon yields up all of its store.
Certain elements derived, in the first
place, from the atmosphere, may become
exhausted sooner than the mineral ingre-
dients of the soil and judicious rotation
and turning in ofgreen crops may restore
the former and bring the land back to
something of its previous fertility, but
cannot possibly carry it beyond the orig
inal starting point-and in both of the
cases supposed, if there is an export of
the products, of the farm, the elements of
the subsoil, in the first, and the mineral
substances in the second, are gradually
sent off and the land finally consigned to
utter sterllity. TO increase, permanent
ly, the fertility of our lands, viewing the
country as whole, we must import fer
,,I;,or- fro,o abroad Rnt rs i1nY1Orts i'll