Keeping one cow / Being the experience of a number of practical writers, in a clear and condensed form, upon the management of a single milch cow

by Various

THE DUNG HEAP.

Truly did the German agriculturist, Schwerz, in seeing the fertile streamlets oozing and trickling away from the exposed manure piles of his opinionated countrymen, denominate the dung heap the “Fountainhead of Benediction.” This, like other blessings, may but too readily be perverted in its uses.

Impressed with the necessity of husbanding every part and portion of this substratum of good agriculture, we choose between two distinct methods of saving and utilizing the fluid and solid dejecta, viz.: the dry and wet. In the former the dejecta are commingled with such absorbents as dry earth, leaves, straw, sawdust, etc.; in the latter, they are received in a tank where they are mixed with sufficient water to stay loss by too rapid fermentation. The application of the manure under either method is respectively in its dry or in its liquid condition.

Fig. 24.—A COW STABLE WITH MANURE CELLAR.

If the dry or absorbent method be adopted, it will be found advantageous to locate the stable on a little declivity, so as to secure a manure cellar with the least excavation.

Thus, in fig. 24, C represents a manure cellar under the cow, with a door at K for removal of manure. The floor and walls, to a hight of two feet, of this cellar should be cemented. The floor, on which the cow stands, should be of two-inch oak plank, with a gutter behind, and a trap to empty the contents of the gutter into the cellar. On level tracts of ground the Flemish stable, as used in parts of the Brabant, and as described in the following plan fig. 25, by Felix Villeroy (Manuel de l’Eleveur de Bètes, â Comes, 6 Ed., p. 63), could be advantageously used for one cow. In figure 25, A is the place where the cow stands; B, Passage for distributing food, etc.; C, Depression where the manure is allowed to accumulate behind the cow; D, Cellar for roots; E, Hay loft.

In this plan the floor A and C would require to be finished in brick and cement, or concrete.

The warmth of the stable might, at times, develop a too rapid fermentation of the manure. This would be checked by working the pile and by forking it over.

Fig. 25.—SECTIONAL VIEW OF STABLE.

But to secure perfect cleanliness, purity of air, and freedom of the hay stored above from the odors of fermentation going on in the dung heap, the manure would be better placed outside of the stable walls, as suggested in figure 26 (see next page).

The bottom of the manure bin is only twenty-four inches below the surface, as on level ground the labor of raising the manure from a deep cellar would be disproportionate to the advantages of the depth. The floor of the stall should be laid in brick and cement, or in concrete, as should be the floor and lower walls of the manure bin. The floor of the stall should be kept covered with dry earth, leaves, sawdust, or spent tan-bark; and the bottom of the bin should be covered to the depth of several inches, with similar absorbents. In the absence of these to-be-preferred materials, weeds, straw, or other dry vegetable refuse, may be used. With the gutter sufficiently inclined, the excessive urine will of itself flow readily to the bin; the solid matter should be removed twice daily, just before the cow is milked. The gutter should be washed down with a pail of water daily, and sprinkled with gypsum (sulphate of lime). The manure pile, as it increases, should be constantly commingled with fresh absorbents. This is most readily and economically done by baiting a pig with a handful of maize cast on the manure in the bin. The lusty porker will go to the bottom of the pile, if need be, for each grain, and by his energetic rooting and trampling, will daily incorporate the materials in the most thorough manner.

Fig. 26.—PLAN OF STABLE WITH CISTERN AND MANURE BIN.

On page 260 of Boussingault’s Rural Economy (Law’s translation) are some very urgent warnings against the frequent turning of dung heaps. His objection, Mr. Law thinks, should be limited to more than three turnings of the dung. But this objection and limitation apply to horse manure, the more active fermentation of which rapidly develops the highly volatile salt known as carbonate of ammonia. There can hardly be too thorough a working together of cow-manure, with its organic absorbents, particularly when the working is accompanied by the compacting tread of animals.

The pile should be watched, and the slightest perception of the pungent ammoniacal odor should be the signal for more absorbents, bearing in mind that all organic matter thus composted becomes a valuable fertilizer, and remembering that nothing should be left undone to increase to the greatest extent possible the source of your anticipated blessings.

The manure bin should, of course, be so covered as to exclude rain and sunshine.

If the liquid or dilute method be employed, in place of the manure bin in the plan, it will be necessary to construct an underground cemented tank or cistern, say of a depth of eight feet and diameter of six to seven feet at the bottom. This tank must be provided with a pump for raising the fluid, the tube of which should terminate in a strainer at about twelve inches from the bottom of the tank. An opening should be left in the top of the cistern for inspection, and for the insertion of a proper implement to stir the sediment. The pump should rise sufficiently high to permit the pumping of the fluid directly into a tank on wheels used for the distribution thereof in the fields. A condemned watering cart, which could probably be purchased cheaply, would be an excellent instrument for this distribution. Sulphate of iron, green vitriol, should be freely used to change the carbonate of ammonia into the sulphate, thereby obtaining a fixed, instead of a highly volatile salt.