Vermont farmer. [volume] (Newport, Orleans County, Vt.) 1870-1877, 1876-05-12
How to Use Ashes, Bone Flour, Muck
Salt and Gypsum.

Col Waring says in Ogden Farm Papers
in American Agricultural that correspon-
dent has bought 800 bushels Of ashes lat 10
cts.) 1000 lbs. of bone -four, (S42l can
get plenty of gypsum four miles away, (S3
per ton), and lime at 20 cents per bushel
Dirty salt costs him $3.50 per ton. Good
muck is available two miles away. He
asks how, out of these materials, to make
the best manure for barley, oats, corn, and
tobacco. lie asks if he can mix bone dust
with good, hardwood ashes aud salt, using
gypsum as divisor and absorbent, and in
what proportion these shall be mixed. Also,
allow can | manufacture superphosphate Of
lime from bone dust ?"
The simplest way to use these materials,
and one that would undoubtedly give a satis-
factory result, would be to use the salt at
the rate Of four or five bushels per acre, as
a top dressing by itself; to use the gypsum
as top dressing on clover, early in the
spring, and not more than two bushels per
acre /; to use the muck, so far as it is used
at all, in compost with stable manure; to
use the ashes alone as top dressing; and
to use the bone -four in the same way.
There is no doubt that with judicious appli-
cationa as to quantity, these would all be
proGtable-iess so perhaps in the case Of the
muck, than Of the other materials, because
of the serious amount of labor involved in
hauling and composing muck, and because
of the further fact that is now very well
established that the best use that can be
made Of stable manure, is to apply it in its
freshest state, as a thin top-dresslDg for
moving lands.
The value of the bone -four would be
very much increased by making it into
superphosphate. The usefulness Of super
phosphate is not to be measured by the
average experience Of ordinary farmers in
using the superphosphates of commerce, for
the reason that many of these are so adul-
terated and "scamped" in manufacture, that
they are almost worthless, and have tended
to bring down the average value Of all
There is no question but that a well made
superphosphate Of lime, with a sufficient
addition Of nitrogenous matter, is worth, for
nearly all uses, quite all that is charged
for it, but farmers are so dependent upon
the statements of the sellers, of whose hon.
esty they have no adequate means for judg-
ing, that where bone-dust and sulphuric acid
can be procured at reasonable cost, it is the
wisest plan to make the article at home.
The mixing of bone dust with hardwood
ashes, even when gypsum is used as an alb
sorbent, is hardly to be recommended, both
because in such admixture the potash Of the
ashes would have tendency to throw of
ammonia from the decomposiug bone dust
beyond the capacity Of the gypsum to absOrt
it, and because better use can be made oil
both materials, by using them differently
Ashes are valuable for reducing whole bones
thus saving the cost of grinding. Put tn,
bones and ashes together, well mixed, (thC
ashes filling all the intersticeS between the
bones into hogshead, under cover, anC
keep the mass well moistened. la time thC
potash uniting with the fatty parts Of the
bones, and reacting on its organic matter
will cause such disintegration Of their sub
stances that they can easily be crushed AM
made into useful fertilizer. Though tn
pulverizing effect thus obtained is vastl,
inferior to that produced by the action o
the sulphuric acid, in decomposing the phos
phate Of lime in the bones, still it is th
best cheap and easy way to reduce larg
bones, aud makes manure that proves very
effective, even when used in so small
quantity as twenty bushels per acre. Wher
both ashes aud refuse bones are available, i
offers an extremely useful and economical
means for obtaining valuable special fer
tilizer-particularly valuable for grass an,
grain crops, aud when used at the rate G
fifty bushels an acre, is good dressing fo
turnips