what can be used as pre grouping wagon loads

[Simond]

I blame Rudy Smellchequer...

[Penlan]

Ok, this is Aberdeen Harbour post-grouping*, not pre-grouping, though I doubt practises had changed much.
BUT I wouldn't give a lot of hope for the wagon sides holding this lot of timber on (on the LH side),

however well they are roped up.

 

 

* Via a topic on RMweb http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/40212-harbour-branches/page-3&do=findComment&comment=2585261

Edited January 22, 2017 by Penlan

[Fat Controller]

Ok, this is Aberdeen Harbour post-grouping*, not pre-grouping, though I doubt practises had changed much.

BUT I wouldn't give a lot of hope for the wagon sides holding this lot of timber on (on the LH side),

however well they are roped up.

 

Aberdeen - Timber loads.jpg

 

* Via a topic on RMweb http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/40212-harbour-branches/page-3&do=findComment&comment=2585261

A couple of ropes over the top, with the sort of knot we used to use on lorry-sheets (was it a sheet-hitch?), and that load would be safe enough, provided the ropes were tightened at the same time.

[Poggy1165]

Just think how many horses the railways employed in a city like Birmingham or Manchester. Of course a lot of manure would end up on the streets and be someone else's problem. But the stables would have to be cleaned out on a daily basis. That's another traffic by the way - think of all the straw they would need. All the horse fodder. This merely to enable the railway itself to function. 

[Buhar]

Manure was a serious business (Harry King of Ankh-Morpok can attest to that) .  An article by John Thomas for the G&SWRA Journal many years ago lists a few in the Glasgow area where the stuff was known as "Police Manure" as the police authority was responsible for its collection.  The was the Board of Police Manure Siding at St Rollox.  Greengairs near Airdrie had four manure sidings and four refuse sidings.  St Helens near Liverpool had one actually called the Night Soil Siding and I don't think it was the only one.  Lancashire potatoes on the flat lands north of the Mersey were grown thereby with the aid of the population of Liverpool and Manchester. 

[Andy Hayter]

The more this and the parallel "sh1t" discussion has progressed on this and the Castle Aching thread, the more I am convinced that there is a distinction between manure and night soil. The former is probably (solely?) animal, the latter is human waste.

 

The question then is could a manure wagon carry night soil or does the distinction end at the wagon loading point?

[Buhar]

I think it is a transition.  It starts as night soil and after a period and process ends up as manure.

[Simond]

I believe that night soil was specifically of human origin. Manure is a more general term. It may end up as compost...

 

Best

Simon

[Poggy1165]

I think a key difference between horse manure (for example) and night soil (human waste) is that the former is ready to go straight on your rhubarb, The latter would destroy it - it needs to be treated, or, as they did back in the day, spread on a field a left to rot for a while.

 

I'm probably simplifying and it may all be a bit more complex than that, but certain types of excrement are more 'fierce' than others. Dog and cat muck, in its raw form, isn't much good for your roses, whereas horse muck is a positive boon.

 

Years ago my Dad's allotment site used to get elephant dung direct from Belle Vue Zoo. Now that was good stuff!

Edited January 24, 2017 by Poggy1165

[Simond]

It's got a lot to do with what you can catch from it.  You don't tend to eat roses, so, whilst it's better to use "vegetarian" droppings, it isn't as critical as it would be on, eg, your potatoes, carrots or rhubarb.  It's all better if it's a bit rotted.

 

best

Simon

[Arthur]

 

Yes, night soil is human waste.

 

 

Because plants/vegetables are difficult to digest the droppings of most herbivores are still rich in nutrients. Dog, cat and human waste contains less of 'value' and more toxins and parasites which can be a risk to human health.

 

Even horse manure is best left to compost before use. Used fresh it can damage plant roots, it also contains viable weed seeds and a spell of composting helps kill them off.

 

We keep horses, currently we have just two and they live out for 8 months of the year and are stabled overnight during the winter. We collect their droppings from the paddocks every day and they generate around 400 feed sacks full per year. That is pure manure and we give it away to friends and neighbours. We always suggest they leave it in a pile for a few months. It has almost no smell.

 

If we get a backlog a local farmer ploughs it into one of his fields. We don't use it ourselves.

 

When stabled, we skip out a mix of droppings, straw and a bit of wasted hay. Again, it has virtually no smell though when we do a deeper clean and remove the urine soaked straw at the bottom there is a smell of ammonia which soon fades. That goes into one of three manure bins, each 16' x 5' x 6' high. One winters use will fill one bin though it soon starts to rot and contract. Garden and kitchen waste goes into that too and the bins are rotated so that the one filled during 2016 will not be dug out until spring 2018. We use all of that, it is a very big garden, on rose beds, strawberry beds, fruit cage and greenhouse where we produce tomatoes on an industrial scale. 4,000 per season.

 

Being rural we also have a septic tank, that is a device which biodigests domestic waste, feeding clean water into a soak away. They don't smell unless badly maintained. It needs partially emptying every three years or so. I was talking to the tanker driver last time he came and he told me that they were no longer allowed to just spray it over farmland and I got the impression that was a relatively recent change.

 

Given the choice of falling onto the manure heap or into the septic tank.....

[BG John]

The advice I've seen on composting human waste from compost loos, is to use it around fruit trees and bushes, and not on vegetables, so it doesn't come into direct contact with stuff we eat. That's what I'll do if I ever get round to building a compost loo.

[Andy Hayter]

But 100 or so years ago................

 

Knowledge of parasites and bacteriology was at very early stages.

 

Biggleswade was a major market garden area used to feed London. It was (as I said above) a reception area for night soil. I wonder, what, if any, processing or breakdown of the night soil took place before food crops were exposed to it.

 

For example if it were put on grassland to feed animals (I am thinking cows for milk especially) as part of the 4 part crop rotation, and then in the subsequent year ploughed for crops, the risk of disease transmission would be significantly reduced. Ditto if the night soil was stored for a few months before use - unlikely perhaps.

[raymw]

Here's the current UK legislation on sludge, USA and elsewhere have different views https://www.gov.uk/guidance/managing-sewage-sludge-slurry-and-silage

[Simond]

Ray

 

Thanks for that rather interesting diversion from my normal breakfast reading material.

 

Then again given the torrent of ..... that we get on the news, perhaps there are some parallels....

 

Best

Simon

[Penlan]

And back to the OP for this Topic.....

 

Circa 1901 - 'A Birmingham Goods Yard'...
Seems to be plenty on the RH side to select from, for a load   

 

Edited January 30, 2017 by Penlan

[sjrixon]

Just sifted through this thread, some amazing info in here.

 

Did anyone find out when the first metal oil drum would have appeared? Lots of kits come with them, got me wondering when they really become common place over wooden barrels etc?

[Andy Hayter]

From Wiki:

 

Henry Wehrhahn, employee of Nellie Bly’s Iron Clad Manufacturing Company of New York, received two patents in December 1905 that would lead to the modern 55-gallon steel barrel.^[2

[Andy Hayter]

Another source says that by 1911 the factory was making up to 1000 barrels per day - which sounds a lot, but in the totality of barrel shipments worldwide would represent a miniscule proportion. 

 

I doubt that they would be common until WW1 when a lack of labour to make traditional wood barrels might have begun to bite.

[Andy Hayter]

As a further thought we must remember that Nellie Bly's company was based in the US.  Prime market was initially moving crude from well heads to rail heads.  As far as Europe is concerned I would doubt that many steel drums arrived before 1917.  

 

A pre-grouping Uk train with a wagonload of steel drums would I suspect be very exceptional.  A wagon with just one drum rather rare.

 

Now I could be wrong, but I challenge the assembled membership to find photographic proof that I am - and to be honest I cannot recall seeing a French wagon so loaded in the 1910s-1920s.   You would have thought that they would have been the first European country to be inundated with these new fangled barrels.   

[Penlan]

I doubt that they would be common until WW1 when a lack of labour to make traditional wood barrels might have begun to bite.

I've had a look through 1,000's of WW1 photo's to do with Fuel supplies - or at least stores supplies - and I can't see any round 55 gallon (or nearby) metal drums.  I expected to see something on the narrow gauge supply trains.

The Germans seemed to be using wooden barrels, we of course had the standard 2 & 5 gallon petrol cans, as already in general use for cars - being mindful the first public petrol station wasn't opened until 1919.

 

There must have been a massive amount of fuel flowing about as the WW1 Tanks were not exactly economical in their mpg..... 

 

Before WW1, Scott on his Antarctic expedition used something like this for fuel.

 

Edited August 11, 2017 by Penlan

[brian777999]

There always seems to be more empty wagons than full wagons in old photos ?

[richard i]

There always seems to be more empty wagons than full wagons in old photos ?

Blast! I try to give most of mine a load. Rethink on that one.

[Talltim]

Everything is bigger in America

(From ebay)

[Caley Jim]

There always seems to be more empty wagons than full wagons in old photos ?

And the majority of open wagons are sheeted.

 

Jim