If the peat be sufficiently dry and powdery, or free from tough lumps, it may usefully serve as bedding, or litter for horses and cattle, as it absorbs the urine, and is sufficiently mixed with the dung in the operation of cleaning the stable. It is especially good in the pig-pen, where the animals themselves work over the compost in the most thorough manner, especially if a few kernels of corn be occasionally scattered upon it.
Mr. Edwin Hoyt, of New Canaan, Conn., writes:--"Our horse stables are constructed with a movable floor and pit beneath, which holds 20 loads of muck of 25 bushels per load. Spring and fall, this pit is filled with fresh muck, which receives all the urine of the horses, and being occasionally worked over and mixed, furnishes us annually with 40 loads of the most valuable manure."
"Our stables are sprinkled with muck every morning, at the rate of one bushel per stall, and the smell of ammonia, etc., so offensive in most stables, is never perceived in ours. Not only are the stables kept sweet, but the ammonia is saved by this procedure."
When it is preferred to make the compost out of doors, the plan generally followed is to lay down a bed of weathered peat, say eight to twelve inches thick; cover this with a layer of stable dung, of four to eight inches; put on another stratum of peat, and so, until a heap of three to four feet is built up. The heap may be six to eight feet wide, and indefinitely long. It should be finished with a thick coating of peat, and the manure should be covered as fast as brought out.
The proportions of manure and peat should vary somewhat according to their quality and characters. Strawy manure, or that from milch-cows, will "ferment" less peat than clear dung, especially when the latter is made by horses or highly fed animals. Some kinds of peat heat much easier than others. There are peats which will ferment of themselves in warm moist weather--even in the bog, giving off ammonia in perceptible though small amount. Experience is the only certain guide as to the relative quantities to be employed, various proportions from one to five of peat for one of manure, by bulk, being used.
When the land is light and needs amending, as regards its retentive power, it is best to make the quantity of peat as large as can be thoroughly fermented by the manure.