506 Report on the Cultivation of Potatoes. 



as also their black vegetable mould, to be conducive to the disease ; also on wet 

 clay land. 



" 18. Principally early Kidney varieties, early Shaw and Eegents ; the Old 

 Ashleaf Kidney and Mona's Pride, another variety of Ashleaf, I And are some 

 of the first to take it. The Lapstone Kidney also seems very susceptible of it. 

 My Prolific Ashleaf resists it well, its top being of a hard woody nature com- 

 pared with many others. 



" 19. This, I see, I have partly answered in No. 18. Without intending, or 

 required as ' puffing ' it, I have invariably found it the best resister I have 

 grown ; and after 20 years is universally acknowledged to be so, 



" 20. As regards the disease, not. 



"21. I renew my stock occasionally, but find them do well for 6 or 7 years 

 without deterioration. 



" 22. As before stated, I have found the application of highly concentrated 

 manures render it more liable to the attack. As regards the selection of setts, 

 if they have been well kept, and in good condition, you cannot err. If they 

 have been badly kept, and perhaps heated, they would come up weakly, their 

 constitution impaired, not strength to resist an attack ; but I have planted 

 diseased tubers, i.e. where the half has been sound, and cut off the diseased 

 part, without any visible difference. 



" 23. I have used lime, sulphur, and soot at different stages of the disease, 

 without any marked effect. 



" 24. I have no faith in pulling up the tops on the appearance of the dis- 

 ease : if it attacks them early, you get a lot of little half-grown tubers, worth- 

 less, which, with a favourable change in the weather, might have come to half a 

 crojj, or more, of good-sized tubers, If they have attained their full growth, 

 there is not so much objection. I have tried it on a small scale, but I still 

 hold to the opinion that it is better to leave them until tbe time for lifting 

 them ; and I find it better to leave th.em in the ground three weeks or a 

 month, or more, after the disease attacks them. The bad ones then show 

 themselves, and you can store the sound ones Avith confidence ; whereas if you 

 lift them too soon after the attack, it is almost an endless job to keep turning 

 them over to pick out the bad ones. 



" 25. I am an advocate for leaving them some time in the ground, earlj^ones 

 required for seed particularly, as, when the weather is warm, it is difficult to 

 prevent them sprouting." 



Mr, Knowles gives the following answers to the same 

 queries : — 



" 1. This farm is open. 



"2. No hedge-row timber. 



" 3, Perfectly level. 



" 4. Sand, slightly mixed with clay to a great depth. 



" 5. The land upon which I grow my potatoes has all been drained at a 

 depth of 2 to 3 feet, no regular distance, 



" 6. I follow no regular system of rotation, but generally have potatoes to 

 follow turnips ; my object in this is to enable me to get my potatoes in 

 early. 



" 7. For the last nine years from 20 to 30 aci'es have been planted per 

 annum. I study to separate the potato crop as far as possible. From three to 

 five years. 



" 8. Immediately after removal of the i^revious croj). We plough as deeply 

 as possible, and leave it in a rough state through the winter. 



" 9. About 20 tons of farmyard manure and 5 or 6 cwts. of phosphate to 

 the acre, at the time of planting potatoes. 



