A dictionary of modern gardening - University Library

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DUR 207
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on straw anil hay the poorest; the ous proportions j :
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Silica, or pure flint
difference between the fertilizing effects Alumina, or pure clay; Lime, combined
of the richest and the inferior farm-yard with carbonic acid in the state of chalk ;
dung is much greater tlian is commonly and Magnesia. See Soil.
believed ; in* many instances the dis- EARTHING-UP, or drawing the soil
parity exceeds one-half; thus that pro- in a ridge to the stems of plants, 13
duced by cattle fed upon oil-cake is beneficial to fibrous-rooted plants, by
fully equal in value to double the reducing the distance from the surface
quantity fed upon turnips. Hence the of the extremities of the plant's roots ;
superior richness of the manure of by inducing the production of rootlets
fattening swine to that of pigs in a lean from the stem ; and sheltering the
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state, and the far superior strength of winter standing crops, for the closer
night-soil to any manure produced from the foliage of these are to the earth the
merely vegetable food. Chemical ex- less is the reduction of heat from the
aminations are hardly necessary to latter, either by radiation
prove these facts. Every farmer who with the colder air.
or contact
has had stall-fed cattle will testify to
their truth; every cultivator will readily
But to tuberous-rooted plants, as the
potato, it is detrimental. In my experi-
acknowledge the superiority of ' townments it reduced the produce onemade,'
that is, corn-produced stable fourth. Many farmers who cultivate
dung, """B5 to ' that "•• from >"•' horses ..v,.»^o fed .V,V. only on the potato extensively, do so with the
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hay and straw, and that night-soil is far horse-hoe alone, no longer using the
superior in strength to either. The plough to earth-up, as was formerly the
relative (juantities employed by the universal practice, and is now with
cultivator betray the same fact, for on those who never profit by experience,
the soils where'he applies twenty loads EARWIG. Forficula auricularis.
of good farm-yard compost per acre, he This destroyer of the peach, apricot,
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