30 SELECTION AND CARE OF THE SEED POTATO 



have tested new potatoes with the sprouts just showing, 

 and old ones that had been sprouted in soil infected with 

 jelly-end and rot. The tubers from the new seed did not 

 show a sign of the disease, while those of the old seed were 

 badly infected. The new seed is more liable to be prongy 

 or knotty, but this can be overcome by cutting away the 

 blossom end. 



Another serious fault of some potato growers is to 

 leave culls lying on the ground from year to year. The 

 weaker hills are always more liable to disease and always 

 produce small tubers. If these small tubers or culls are left 

 on the ground, the new crops and the land is bound to be- 

 come infected with the disease ; and if this way of handling 

 the crop is continued, the disease will increase with great 

 rapidity and soon no crop can be raised. 



I have noticed in a volunteer hill of potatoes, where they 

 have lain on the ground over winter, that the center eye in 

 the bud or blossom end is always the first one to sprout. It 

 is this eye that produces the crop resulting in prongy tubers, 

 and I maintain that this center eye in the blossom end is the 

 eye that finally causes the "running out" of the potato, al- 

 though it is the strongest eye and is the first to come up 

 when planted. The grower should not, therefore, under 

 any circumstance, allow culls to lay on the soil where the 

 same crop is to be grown the following year. These culls 

 cause the degeneration of the potato, breed diseases and 

 tuber moth. If, instead, these culls were used for stock 

 feed, either in the raw state or cooked, they would more 

 than pay for the trouble, and the following crop would be 

 greatly improved. 



I have learned that it is wise to change the soils used 

 for potatoes from year to year. If they are planted in peat- 

 land one year, the seed produced should be planted in a 



