Vermont State Horticultural Society 87 



to furnish the crops with what they need, else they would die. 

 When we began growing potatoes such talk as that was called 

 "book farming" and was all "bosh." Well, we didn't think so 

 and we began to work along these lines. We began in the early 

 spring, just as soon as the earth would allow us to plow. We 

 plowed and harrowed, stirring the surface so that a mulch was . 

 formed. We kept that up, — the stirring of the surface, until 

 the vines covered the ground and kept it moist. We would go 

 out directly after a rain and harrow the ground and save the 

 moisture, and we kept right at it, never allowing the surface to 

 dry or crust. We did not stop even when the potatoes were in 

 bloom ; we took a one horse cultivator and stirred the earth until 

 there was no space to be seen between the rows ; then the plants 

 will shade the ground. To grow one pound of weeds will take 

 from 300 to 400 pounds of water, — so don't try tO' grow weeds. 

 Potatoes can't eat the fertilizer without the water. The water 

 passing down through the plant food dissolves it and then it 

 is taken up by the weeds and your potatoes lose it. A man is 

 very foolish to allow the weeds to take the water when the crops 

 need so much of it. We have had ten acres of potatoes from 

 which I venture to say that a man could carry in one arm the 

 amount of weeds he could find in that piece. We kept them 

 clean. We have done it with a smoothing harrow and a weeder, 

 and we have done it cheaply ; it doesn't cost a great deal and the 

 results have been wonderful. 



The roots of the potato do not grow right down ; they run 

 across, and when they are not cultivated shallow, the fine fibers 

 are torn off and the plant is put to the expense of growing them 

 over again, and nothing has been gained by such pruning. I 

 have seen farmers riding a cultivator with a big stone also placed 

 on the machine, weighing 50 pounds to set the teeth down good 

 and hard and deep, when the potatoes were half grown, and 

 they have torn off half the roots, and then they talked about poor 

 luck. It was simply ignorance, not knowing that to tear them 

 off they reduced the yield and particularly so if the season was 

 dry. 



This is not theory. I could give you no one idea thas has 

 put so many dollars in our pockets as this one thing. 



I remember in 1881, — which was the driest year we ever 

 had in the west, — although all through on the Atlantic coast it 

 was not so dry, that after the potatoes were six inches high 

 there was no rain. There were thousands of farmers in Ohio. 

 Illinois and Indiana that did not have any potatoes to eat all 

 that winter. There was not one single bushel of merchantable 

 potatoes in our township so far as I know except those that grew 

 on our farm. We sold potatoes to farmers in our township that 



