176 SOUTHERN FIELD CROPS 



use on the less rolling lands, especially on the northern 

 edge of the cotton-belt; and its use on level and gently 

 rolling land should become more general throughout the 

 South. 



The chief advantage of checking consists in the saving 

 of hand labor or hoeing. In order to practice checking, 

 the land should be nearly level or very gently rolling and 

 well drained, since checking cannot well be practiced where 

 it is necessary to plant on ridges, as is done on poorly 

 drained land. The yield of checked corn is nearly the 

 same as that from drilling, provided the number of plants 

 per acre be the same in 'each case. 



Corn can be checked either by using a check-row planter, 

 (Fig. 88), or by carefully marking off rows at uniform dis- 

 tances and opening the planting furrows at regular inter- 

 vals and perpendicular to the first marking. The seed corn 

 may be carefully dropped by hand in the furrows where 

 they are intersected by the cross marks. In using a check- 

 row corn planter, two rows are planted at once at uniform 

 distances. This is done either by means of a wire at- 

 tached to the planter and stretching across the field, or by 

 having a second man to ride on the machine and regulate 

 the distance for dropping the seed. 



165. Number of kernels to plant in a hill. It is cus- 

 tomary throughout the cotton-belt to plant about three 

 grains in each hill, even though only one plant is to be 

 allowed to live. This thick planting is chiefly due to the 

 fear of the budworms, which kill many young plants when 

 3 to 10 inches high. It is also partly due to the use of seed 

 that germinates poorly and to insufficient preparation of 

 the land. Attention to these points will often make it 



