The new dominion. [volume] (Morgantown, W. Va.) 1876-1904, 1877-09-29
TOPICS FOR FARMERS.
Economy in Drawing Manure.-N

able.
Most farmers, he says, waste q great
amount of time and team labor in get
ting out their manure piles. Waste in
this particular involves more loss than
in any other. There is usually only
limited time available to get out the
seasons manure What is not got out
within this time is left to waste in the
barn-yard another six or twelve months.
The loss on this is enormous even if
there were no waste of fertilizing ele-
ments. The manure heap is the farm
er's capital. When put on his fields, it
pays him larger interest than any other
investment, sometimes fifty or one hun
bred per cent. or more. When left in
the barn-yard there is no interest, but
with the best of care the principal is
more or less impaired. Let us see how
the manure is usually got out. The
| farmer in the morning sets his hired
man at the work alone, with one team
and one wagon. He will get out eight
to twelve loads per day, according to
the ease Of pitching and the distance the
manure has to be drawn. Call it ten
loads, and you have had man and team
employed whole day with very insig-
nificant results My way is always to
! draw with two wagons-one to be loaded
in the barn-yard while the other is in
the field. One team only is needed,
slipping the bolt from the whiffle-trees,
dropping the tongue, and taking team
and whiffle-trees from one wagon to the
other. 1t takes but moment of time,
and is much more easily as well as
| nlrI xr1 4xx,r. Hja
trees and unhitching the traces. 1t is
better than having two teams, as there
| is constant emulation between the man
in the field and the man at the heap to
| see which shall come out ahead of the
other. Not enough use is made by farm
ers of this spirit of emulation. Farm
work is mostly rather isolated, but it is
better generally for two men to work to-
| gether than for one man to work alone.
Some hired men will do very little un-
less they have company. Rarely will
any one do as much alone as he would if
working with others. This is one adj
vantage which the large farmer has over
the small one. A single man, working
alone, even if he be the farmer himself,
soon becomes listless and discouraged and
can not work as well as in company
In drawing manure, | use no wagon
box; with two or three stout planks for
the bottom, and two wide boards for
side pieces, the rigging is complete.
Arrived in the field, take of side
board, and with potato hook pull off
enough manure for heap; starting
the team, another heap is made from the
other side, and then one from each end,
| mo lr.n ii
or more heaps from the load. rake off
in heaps because the manure is unloaded
so much more rapidly than by pitching
If had to pitch it over wagon-b box, as
is usually done, l should spread as I'M
loaded. 1t is in this rapid unloading
that much of the saving is made. If
| the distance to draw is short or the ma
nure inconvenient to get at, | sometimes
find it better to have two men to unload.
| The manure heaps are spread afterward
while the team is blowing or engaged in
| other work. 1t is material waste to
| allow horses to be idle while the manure
is being spread.
The farmer himself should generally
| draw out the load. He knows better
than any one esle where the poorest
spots are, and where the manure should
be spread thickest. By raking off in
heaps, the labor is considerably less than
in loading. When drawing, | arrange
it so as to put the manure from the hog
pen or other spot that is of extra
strength on the poorest part of the field.
You can't tell one hired man in hun
dred how to do this. Many of them
would not understand and many more
would not care. Drawing manure is a
work in which more than any other the
farmer himself should take hand. If
he be a really good farmer he will
hardly be content unless he does
| By my method, drawing out manure
with two wagons, and one or sometimes
two men in the barn-yard, / can get
out twenty-five to thirty-ive loads per
day. This summer, in drawing manure
on wheat ground, got out thirty-one
loods in a day and we stopped work at
six o'clock. But | don't stop drawing
when the easy pitching ends. Every
corner in the paved barn-vard and under
the sheds is scraped and the scrapings
put on the wagon. The very last loads
got were the richest of all-the con-
tents of deep pockets were the valuable
portions of the manure have settled,
perhaps for years. So soon as the barn
yard is thoroughly cleaned, it is covered
| with straw to absorb the liquid drop-
pings of the stock. In this way large
amount of straw is made into valuable
manure. / aim to clean the barn-yard
twice year-in spring and fall-snd
each time am particular to have all the
manure got out. Doing this is By all
odds the most important secret OF good
farming. Many farmers make large
quantities of manure, but of what avail
is it if left for years unused in their
barn-yards? Those who draw manure
regularly every year, zoo often leave
ten to twenty loads Of the most valua-
BILE fertilizers while their crops suffer
for the want of then.
Grating the Walnut.-A correspond
dent says: We have in our field, some
distance from the house, very fine
walnut, the oily nuts of which I find
beneficial in relieving severe cough to
which am subject. Last spring l sent
ogf little boy for a limb of this tree to
graft into small Seeding walnut that
stood in our yard. The limb he brought
me looked more fit for crows nest
than a grating scion; but / cut three of
the best scions that could, sawed off
the top and the one side branch of the
little bush and set two gratis in the
main stock and one in the side branch :;
the last one was superfuous. Every
| time I passad that WOW found - 80