10 FARMING. 



Irish potatoes in the United States are found in eastern North Caro- 

 lina. 



Mr. Makely of Hyde County, whose soil occupies a similar deep 

 bed of black vegetable mold as that of Mr. Lindsay, plants from 400 

 to 600 barrels annually for the early market, and there are numerous 

 growers who plant from 50 to 100 acres annually. The early potato 

 crop is one of the crops of the great trucking section, and the methods 

 of culture will be more fully treated of when we come to practices 

 of the truck growers. In the eastern section the Irish "potato is 

 grown primarily as an early crop for the Northern market, and from 

 seed of this early crop a late crop is grown for seed, for no truck 

 farmer now depends on Northern seed potatoes for his crop. But in 

 the plateau section in Henderson and Transylvania counties, and 

 some other of the counties west of the Blue Eidge Mountains, there 

 has grown up a great industry in the production of late potatoes and 

 cabbages for the markets farther South, and great quantities of these 

 are shipped every fall to Florida and other points in the lower South 

 where they cannot so well be produced at that season. In these ele- 

 vated mountain sections the climate approaches that of the Middle 

 States, and the potatoes and cabbages are grown after the Northern 

 fashion, and from their greater nearness to the Southern market the 

 growers have a decided advantage over those farther North. 



SWEET POTATOES. 



' The sw r eet potato in North Carolina is more of a general farm 

 crop than the Irish potato. It is grown in all parts of the State, and 

 while the varieties preferred in the North are produced to some ex- 

 tent by the market-gardeners of the eastern section, the greater part 

 of the sweet potato crop is composed of the yam varieties that are 

 preferred in the South to the dry Nansemonds which are used in the 

 North, where people steam or boil them, a practice to which the 

 softer yams will not submit. Northern people coming South always 

 bring with them their preference for a dry sweet potato, but it takes 

 but a short experience with the sugary yams to convince them that a 

 well-baked yam potato is far superior in sweetness to the dry yellow 

 potatoes they have been accustomed to. The lighter grey soils of the 

 piedmont section and the sandy lands of the coast are the best soils 

 for the sweet potato, and with good cultivation it is not hard to grow 

 a good crop, even as much as 500 bushels per acre. They are bedded 

 in early spring and the sprouts set later as in other sections. But for 

 the best potatoes for winter preservation cuttings are made from the 

 tips o!f the vines in July, and are set in the same way as the early 

 spring plants, and if the ground is moist hardly a cutting will at 

 that season fail to grow. 



It has been found that these late potatoes, which are not so fully 

 matured as those from the spring slips, will keep far better in winter. 



