114 . BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



manure to the land, which should be well ploughed in as 

 early in the spring as possible. As soon as the weeds have 

 come up the land should be cross-ploughed as fine as possible 

 with a swivel-plough ; the land should then be harrowed and 

 rolled, when it will be ready for the seed. The seed should be 

 soaked in warm water twenty-four hours previous to planting, 

 and sunned a short time to dry the surface-moisture, that the 

 seed may not clog in the seed-sower. The seed may be 

 planted with any suitable machine that will sow thin ; two 

 pounds of seed per acre is more than enough, if judiciously 

 planted ; too thick sowing results in very unnecessary and 

 expensive thinning; or if neglected, in a small growth of 

 roots, expensive to harvest and to handle. 



The seed may be planted from early in May to the 10th of 

 June. Our practice is to plant in straight rows twenty-two 

 inches apart, and the plants should be thinned to three or four 

 inches in the row. The after-cultivation of the carrot should 

 be always prompt; "hoe the ground and not the weeds," 

 should be the motto. The horse-hoe can be used in the culti- 

 vation of the carrot to a very considerable extent, and our 

 cultivation is very like that given the mangold. English 

 turnips can be sown between the rows with the seed-sower by 

 the 20th of July, without injury to the carrot, and will add 

 materially to the product of the land. There are many 

 varieties of carrot now grown in market-gardens, and as field 

 crops. We have tried nearly all the prominent sorts that have 

 been introduced in the last thirty years. 



The Long Orange has for many years been a standard field 

 variety. Perhaps no kind has been more extensively culti- 

 vated, or has better repaid its culture ; but there are other 

 kinds also very desirable. The intermediate, which are shorter 

 but larger in diameter — a very convenient root to handle in 

 feeding — having a decided advantage in storage, occupying 

 less space per ton, and in harvesting, to be pulled by hand, 

 will yield a heavy weight per acre. There is also the Early 

 Horn carrot, a shorter and heavier root in proportion to the 

 size, thirty-five bushels weighing a ton ; it takes forty bushels 

 of the long sorts ; they can be grown closer and make less 

 tops than the longer sorts, and are more desirable for domes- 

 tic use. The white sorts are not much grown by our farmers ; 



