1889."] PUBLIC DOCUMENT — No. 4. 529 



must have rendered the influences of an additional supply of 

 manurial substances less marked, it appears that sulphate of 

 potash produced better results in our case than muriate 

 of potash. 



3. The premature dying out of the vines, accompanied 

 by blight or scab, or both, must be considered a controlling 

 cause of an exceptionally large amount of small potatoes. 



4. Some peculiar condition of the soil upon the lands 

 used for this experiment is to be considered the real seat of 

 our trouble. (For further details, see annual report.) 



To test the correctness of conclusion 4 still further, the 

 experiment was continued for another year. 



1887. — The same plats as in previous years were utilized 

 for the experiment. The subdivisions remained unchanged. 

 The fertilizers applied were the same as in 1886. 



The lands were ploughed and harrowed during the first 

 week of May, and the potatoes planted in all plats May 11. 

 First quality potatoes, Beauty of Hebron, raised in Ver- 

 mont, were used as seed. The growth looked well upon all 

 plats until July 28, when the vines on plats 2 and 3 began 

 to turn yellow. They commenced drying up August 9, and 

 by August 12 were dry on all plats. An examination of the 

 little potatoes, July 1, showed already, in every case, the 

 marks of scab. 



The entire crop, when harvested, was so seriously affected 

 by scab that it proved worthless in the general market. 



The months of July and August were exceptionally wet 

 and wann in our part of the State, a circumstance which has, 

 most likely, aggravated our trouble. 



The potato crop was in that year quite extensively a fail- 

 ure in our vicinity, wherever low lands had been used for its 

 production. 



1888. — The continued failure to raise upon this field a 

 potato crop free from a serious attack of scab had strength- 

 ened our belief that neither the kind of fertilizer applied, nor 



