346 



POT 



POT 



The first of May is perhaps the 

 right season for planting potatoes, j 

 in a dry warm soil : But they will 

 sometimes produce well, though 

 planted at the last of June. An 

 early crop will be better ripened, 

 and more dry and mealy. A late 

 one is unsolid and watery, as the 

 roots do not arrive to their full ma- 

 turity. 



From experiments which have 

 been made since the time in which 

 Mr. Deane wrote, it has been found 

 that whole potatoes are best for 

 planting. The Hon.JosiahQuincy 

 in a letter to the Corresponding 

 Secretary of the Massachusetts Ag- 

 ricultural Society, observes •, "I 

 had directed my farmer to plant a 

 field of about six acres, with the 

 large red potatoe, called the River 

 Plate potatoe. Being not pre- 

 sent when he began the labour, he 

 had planted a part of two rows, with 

 the potatoe whole. Coming upon 

 the field, I objected to the practice 

 as wasteful, and directed him to cut 

 the residue of the potatoes, and to 

 put a mark so as the place where 

 the whole potatoes were planted, 

 might be known. In the whole 

 course of vegetation, the whole po- 

 tatoes had a decided superiority 

 over every other part of the field, 

 in the vigour and size of the tops ; 

 and, at harvest, in com.paring 

 these rows with the adjoining 

 rows, the product of the rows 

 planted whole exceeded an equal 

 extent of the adjoining rows, plant- 

 ed with cut potatoes, more than one 

 third. There was notJung in the 

 cultivation, or state of the land, 

 which could produce this differ- 

 ence, except the circumstance of 



the onehaving been planted whole, 

 and the other cut." Mass. Jlgr, 

 Rep. vol. F.p. 64. 



The shooting parts exist in a po- 

 tatoe, in the form of a tree, of 

 which the stock is at the but,or root 

 end, 1 therefore take care to cut 

 athwart these parts as little as pos- 

 sible : For though they will grovr 

 any way, the greater length of 

 shooting stem there is in a set, the 

 more strong and vigorous will be its 

 growth at tirst. 



If dung be used, it may bespread 

 before the second ploughing,or else 

 laid under the sets. The latter me- 

 thod will give a larger crop. Dung 

 laid under the sets, will produce 

 more than if laid above them ; as 

 Mr. Wynn Baker proved by accu- 

 rate experiments. The feeding 

 roots should go into the dung, not 

 directly into hungry earth below ; 

 and those roots strike downwards ; 

 and therefore need some loose earth 

 under the dung to extend them- 

 selves into. 



The fashionable way of planting 

 potiitocs in hills, may be as good as 

 any \n rough ground, or that which 

 is not well subdued. But in a rich, 

 mellow soil, well pulverised, the 

 drill method is to be preferred. 

 The setts may be either in si:;gle 

 rows, three feet, or double, one 

 foot apart, and from seven to nine 

 inches asunder in the rows. One 

 of my neighbours planted in his 

 garden, drills and rows of hills al- 

 ternately of equal length, and equal- 

 ly manured ; when he dug them he 

 found the drill rows produced twice 

 as much as the other. It is not more 

 labour to lay the dung in drills, 

 than in hills ; and the labour of hoe- 



