152 MISSOURI STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



ing plants. Go over occasionally and pull out or otherwise destroy 

 any weeds that have escaped. It is not uncommon to obtain with 

 good culture five or more pounds per hill, and one acre planted 2^x2| 

 contains about 6,876 hills, and five pounds per hill gives 34,380 pounds, 

 or 687 bushels per acre, which may be easily obtained by planting seed 

 raised and stored according to previous instructions. 



HARVESTING. 



Early varieties, to have the tubers keep and retain their highest 

 degree of perfection, and stored with the greatest amount of rich and 

 wholesome nutriment for human food and for the future use of the 

 plant, some directions have already been given ; and to secure such re- 

 sults it is necessary to closely observe several requisites, viz.: First, 

 harvesting just at the right time or before the feeding or fibrous roots 

 commence to die and the tops to draw away the nourishment stored in 

 the tubers. Second, keep the tubers from drying and wilting from ex- 

 posure to light and heat, by gathering them up as fast as dug and put- 

 ting tbem in a dark and moist place. It is the prevalent custom in har- 

 vesting to leave the tubers in the field a day or so to cure, and to spread 

 early varieties if dug early in an open and airy place, exposed to light 

 and heat to keep them from rotting — ^just the thing to rot them. 



When the tubers are exposed to the light and heat (unnatural ele- 

 ments as nature puts them under ground in a dark, cool and moist 

 soil), they absorb elements from the atmosphere very rapidly, which 

 changes their composition and renders them unpalatable and unhealth- 

 ful, and therefore unfit for human food, and the drying and wilting 

 process that they undergo in this exposure puts them in a condition to 

 sprout at a very low temperature. We often see potatoes carried many 

 miles to market in balk in open wagons with no care even to shield 

 them from the hot rays of the sun, and see them exposed for sale spread 

 upon store floors and in open baskets, boxes and barrels on the side- 

 walks, and frequently in the sun ; and in this exposed condition their 

 nutritive juices are evaporated and foreign elements are absorbed un- 

 til the^ become somewhat of the consistency of the foliage and stems 

 of the plant in proportion to the amount of exposure. There may be 

 people who would relish potato tops for greens, but I think they are 

 few and greens would have to be S(!arce. Late varieties re- 

 quire the same care with regard to exposure as early va- 

 rieties. And here, allow me to again call your attention to the 

 importance of selecting a sufficient amount of the early varieties as 

 soon as dug to plant after three or four days' drying and wilting, to 



