Part 3 (1/2)
Mr. Landreth, the celebrated seedsman of Philadelphia, applied $500 worth of Peruvian guano last spring, princ.i.p.ally on the bean crop--he thinks guano admirably adapted to all the Bra.s.sica tribe, including turnips, cabbages, rutubaga, radishes and all cruciform plants. Upon a lawn which appeared to be running out, he applied guano, and the gra.s.s is now green and vigorous. The character of his soil may be judged from its location; it is on the Delaware river above Bristol, and had been awfully skinned before he came in possession. Now, with a liberal expenditure for manures, he gets two crops a year.
_Guano for gra.s.s lands._--The Germantown Telegraph says: ”The application of guano broadcast to gra.s.s lands has been found to produce a decided difference in the crop. In several instances this season, where Peruvian guano has been applied at the rate of 200 lbs. per acre, about the middle of April, the yield of hay has been double in quant.i.ty, over the intermediate lands not so treated; and in every instance noticed, it is believed that the difference in quant.i.ty produced will amply repay the cost of the guano.”
GUANO IN NEW JERSEY.
Guano has not been extensively used in New Jersey, owing to the abundance of green sand marl, which is a very valuable fertilizer, abounding in that part of the State most in need of artificial manures.
Guano has, wherever used, produced the most astonis.h.i.+ng results. One of these we witnessed upon the farm of Mr. Edward Harris, a gentleman well known for his enterprising spirit of improvement and intelligence in agriculture, who resides at Moorestown, which lies in the sandy region east of Philadelphia. He sowed 400 lbs. to the acre, plowed in with double plow, sowed oats and seeded with timothy, which upon similar soil often ”burns out” for want of shade, after the oats are harvested. Not so in this case. The shattered oats from a remarkably fine crop, vegetated and grew with such a dark green luxuriance, there was more danger of the young gra.s.s being smothered out; so he had to put the mowers at work, who cut heavy swaths of this second crop of oats, for hay. If it had been situated so it could have been fed off, the amount of pasture would have been almost incalculable. It is needless to say the effect of guano upon this land, was not evanescent. Other trials made by Mr. Harris, have convinced him of its value to Jersey farmers, and that good as ”Squank.u.m marl” undoubtedly is, farmers would do better to expend part, at least, of their money in guano.
The name of James Buckalew is known, perhaps, more extensively than any other in New Jersey, as one of her most enterprising, rapidly improving, money making farmers, whose testimony in favor of guano may be easily obtained by any one who will take the trouble to go and see what beautiful farms he has made out of the barren sands near the Jamestown station, on the Camden & Amboy railroad, by the use of lime, plaster, marl, manure and guano. It is a pity that every one who doubts the feasibility of profitably improving the worst land in that State, by the power of such an agent as Peruvian guano, could not see what has been done by Mr. Buckalew. Let them also look at what were once bare sand hills around the residence of Commodore Stevens, at South Amboy, a gentleman who ought to be more renowned for his improvements on land than water, notwithstanding his world wide reputation, in connection with the yacht America. Go ask how it is that these drifted sand hills have been covered with rank gra.s.s, clover, corn, turnips and other luxuriant crops; the very echo of the question will be, guano.
Look at the astonis.h.i.+ng crops of Professor Mapes, at Newark. Peruvian guano, in combination with his improved superphosphate of lime, hath wrought the miracle, aided as it has been, by the deepest plowing ever done in that State.
Mr. Samuel Allen, at Morristown, has now growing upon a poor barren, gravelly knoll, a crop of corn which might put to blush the owner of a rich and well manured field, and which ought to put to blush some of the unbelievers in the power of guano to produce such a growth upon such a soil; rather where there was no soil, hardly enough to grow a respectable crop of mullen stalks. Mr. Allen has tried guano for several years upon every kind of garden vegetable, with the most wonderful success. A crop of Lima beans now growing exhibit its wonderful power in the strongest manner. The application has been made by a small dose at planting and two sprinklings hoed in during their growth.
A great many other persons in this State have produced most wonderful effects upon land almost utterly worthless, while in the immediate benefits, those who have applied it to lands in good condition, have profited more than with double the cost of manure.
_Guano for Peach Trees._--A New Jersey nurseryman a.s.sured us of his firm conviction in the power of guano to cure the yellows in peach trees--that no grub or worm can be found alive in the roots of a tree where guano is applied--that young trees can be brought into bearing by the use of guano, a year earlier than by any other forcing process with which he is acquainted.
GUANO ON LONG ISLAND.[1]
One gentleman a.s.sures us he tried an experiment very carefully, and found an application of guano at two and a half cents a pound, 300 lbs.
to the acre, more economical than hauling his own manure one mile. The fair value of team work and cost of labor hired, was more to the acre than the guano, and the first crop quite inferior, the second no difference, and the third slightly in favor of the manure. He thinks buying city manure, particularly street sweepings, about the poorest use to which he could put his money, as he certainly could make 50 per ct.
more upon the same amount expended in Peruvian guano. Professor Mapes entertains the same opinion, about hauling manure, where guano, or rather with him, guano improved by the addition of his ”improved superphosphate of lime,” can be procured.
Dr. Peck, a gentleman well known for his philanthropic motives in settling and improving the ”Long Island barrens,” has proved that every acre of that long neglected, and until quite recently considered worthless portion of the Island, can be rendered fertile, so as to be cultivated with great profit, either in farms or market gardens, by the aid of this greatest blessing ever bestowed by Providence upon an unfertile land.
Several of the Messrs. Smith, of Smithtown, could show any Long Island farmer who still has doubts upon the subject, that guano is the greatest worker of miracles in this age--that it is just as capable of producing great crops on the barren sands of the Island, as it is on the tide water sh.o.r.es of Virginia, upon soil of the same character.
A great deal has been said in deprecation of the waste of fertilizing matters in the city of New York, in which the writer of this pamphlet has conscientiously joined; because, he thought it wicked to commit such waste, while we were surrounded by lands lying idle, for the want of these very substances. Precious, however, as they would be to the farmer, he cannot afford to use them. That is, it would be poor economy for a Long Island farmer, no matter how near the city, to expend money in the hire of men, vessels and teams, to save, carry, haul and apply to his farm, the immense amount of fertilizing substances now wasted; because the same capital expended in purchasing and applying guano, will produce a much greater profit. The difference in cartage is enough to astonish one who has never thought upon the subject. One man with a pair of horses can easily carry guano enough in one day, thirty miles into the country, to manure ten acres of ground. To carry an equivalent of city manure, in the same time, would require 300 pair of horses and 350 men. Who can wonder that barren lands have remained barren? Who will not wonder if they still continue so, with such fertilizers as their owners might possess to render them otherwise? But few of the residents in the interior of Long Island, if the manure was given to them, can afford the time and team work to haul 300 loads for ten acres, while all can afford the time for one load; and they may be morally certain the capital invested in that load will be returned in the first crop. The great advantage of guano over all other manures is, the concentration of immense fertilizing power in such small bulk.
_Guano in New York and Connecticut_, generally, has been less used than any sound reason will justify. A comparatively small portion of the market gardeners--a few gentlemen in the improvement of rural homes, and here and there a nurseryman, have derived immense benefits; but the bulk of the farmers are still either faithless, or ignorant; in most cases the latter, of the benefits they might derive from a liberal expenditure in the means, and the only means within their reach, of rendering their lands productive.
_Effect of Guano on Garden Seeds._--From the society of Shakers, at Lebanon, so justly celebrated for growing garden seeds, we receive the most positive a.s.surance that no manure ever applied by them, has had such an effect as guano. The production of seeds of all descriptions, is not only increased, but the quality is improved to an astonis.h.i.+ng degree. The same effect has been noted upon wheat, particularly in our account of Mr. Newton's operations. So also has it in England. This view of the case should give an additional value to guano to the farmer, as not only an improver of the quant.i.ty of his products, but by the gradual improvement in the quality of the seed, calculated to be of vast benefit to him in that respect. Garden seeds raised by guano, as soon as their superiority becomes known, will be in such demand that no other can be sold. Another advantage will arise from the fact that such seeds will be found entirely free from weeds, as none grow after a few years upon land manured only with guano.
The beautiful residence of Mr. Edwin Bartlett, near Tarrytown, exhibits strong evidence of the fertilizing power of guano upon the poor, unproductive hill sides of Westchester Co. That place, now so luxuriant, was noted a few years ago, as too poor to support gra.s.shoppers. It was the poverty stricken joke of the neighborhood.
[Footnote 1: For interesting letters from Long Island, see appendix.]
GUANO IN Ma.s.sACHUSETTS.
We have heard a good many a.s.sertions that guano, however valuable it might be upon the warm sandy soils of the south, would not answer in the cold land and climate of the New England States. To refute this fallacy, we have some strong testimony. Seven years ago, while the very name of guano, and much more its virtues were unknown to half the farmers of America, Mr. S. S. Teschemacher, of Boston, a gentleman of science and practical skill in gardening, became so fully convinced of its value to the cultivators of American soil, he published a pamphlet for the purpose of inducing others to profit by its use. From that pamphlet we make a few extracts. He says--”One of the numerous objections to this manure is, that, although it may answer well in the humid atmosphere of England, it cannot produce equal benefit in the hot, sandy soils of this country. In reply to this, it may be observed, that the sandy soils of South America are more hot than they are here; and, on the coast of Peru, where it is most used, it scarcely ever rains at all. The truth is, that it certainly requires moisture to decompose it, and enable it to enter into the juices of the plant; by no means, however, so much as is usually supposed; but, once absorbed by the roots and plants, it imparts that strength and solidity which enable them to resist both drought and cold.
”It is beyond dispute that guano contains the chief ingredients required for the growth of plants. The instances hereafter adduced will show that the combination and form of these ingredients are such as to promote not only its immediate action, but clearly to accelerate considerably the progress of vegetation.”
The chief ingredients, then, of guano, are,
Ammonia, in various forms and combinations; Phosphate and oxalate of lime and magnesia; Salts of potash and soda; Animal organic matter; Sand and moisture.