260 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



June 



For the New England Farmer. 



HIGH FARMING — PROF. MAPES'S FARM 

 —SUPERPHOSPHATE. 



BY JUDGE FRENCH. 



Not many weeks ago, we published a pretty 

 careful criticism upon the farming operations of 

 Mr. Sheriff Mechi, of Tiptree Hall, England, one 

 of the highest farmers of that country, and our 

 conclusions were, that although Mr. Sheriff Mechi 

 might make money in England by underlaying 

 170 acres of poor land with iron pipes, and pump- 

 ing through them all his manure with a steam- 

 engine ; by underdraining five feet deep, and 

 doing other things accordingly, yet that his own 

 statement showed that with American prices for 

 the labor he charged, and American prices for 

 the crops he credited, he would run his farm ru- 

 inously in debt. His success, we said, results 

 through the low price of labor mainly, the price 

 there being but about half our New England 

 prices. 



In the New York weekly Tribune of March 

 26, 1859, is an account of the farm of Prof. 

 Mapes, near Newark, New Jersey. The account 

 is very interesting to farmers, because of its en- 

 couraging results. The farm contains 121.^ acres, 

 and the statement shows that the expenses upon 

 it for the year 1858 were $3,152 60, and the in- 

 come from it was $11,027 88, leaving a nett 

 profit of $8,475 28, after paying all expenses and 

 a fair rent for the land! Only 33:i acres of the 

 farm was in cultivated crops, the rest being 

 grass and woods. The account below gives the 

 items of income and expenses, with a balance 

 which may challenge competition on either side 

 of the water. 



Having some acquaintance with Prof. Mapes, 

 having seen his farm, though not in the grow- 

 ing season, and having met his foreman, Mr. 

 Quin, both on and off the farm, and talked with 

 him about the farm operations, we feel some 

 confidence in our ability to form a correct opin- 

 ion of this statement. 



That the professor is a man of great scientific 

 knowledge of agriculture, and of wonderful tact 

 in his application of science to the culture of 

 his crops, everybody who sees him and his farm 

 will at once admit. He understands the theo- 

 ries of farming, and his farm shows that he 

 makes his knowledge practical. He raises the 

 very crops that pay the best in his market, and 

 he gets the largest crops and the highest prices. 

 His farm is not indeed, a regular /"«/■?«, but rath- 

 er a market garden, a nursery, a seed establish- 

 ment, and a fruit garden. 



Yet these are departments open to many of 

 us, and why cannot we make profit of them as 

 well as he ? To be sure, we cannot expect to 

 get eigJit and twelve dollars per hundred for pears, 



if we could raise them in any great quantities, 

 but our impression is, that nobody can show in 

 this country better dwarf pear trees than Prof. 

 Mapes. 



He is the inventor of Mapes' Superphosphate 

 of Lime, and it is not strange that his rivals in 

 patent manures should detract from him and his 

 successful farming. 



Five thousand tons of this manure have, some 

 seasons, been manufactured at the works in which 

 he is largely interested, near his place. His farm 

 is manured almost exclusively, with this prepa- 

 ration, and acres were pointed out to us, on 

 which were the finest fruit trees, and beds of 

 strawberries, besides the ordinary crops, which 

 had received, for many years, no other manure. 



The professor stated, in our hearing, at the 

 New York Farmers' Club, that stable manure 

 could not be sold in his neighborhood for .$1,50 

 a cord, to be hauled one mile, because the su- 

 perphosphate is cheaper, and his neighbors who 

 were present, suggested no doubt of his correct- 

 ness. Yet, at Exeter, it costs us $5,00 a cord, 

 besides hauling, and this is probably an average 

 price in the larger towns in New England. 



After all our bids, and yets, and apologies for 

 Prof. Mapes's astonishing profits, there is a large 

 balance of credit to be divided between his mode 

 of culture and his superphosphate. "How does 

 he get so large crops at so little cost ?" is the 

 question. His explanation is found in three 

 points, — thorough drainage, deep and fine cul- 

 ture, and the use of superphosphate. 



He underdrains with tiles from four to five 

 feet deep ; he subsoils eighteen or twenty inches 

 deep, and works his root and hoed crops con- 

 stantly in summer, with a little subsoiler drawn 

 by one mule, and with the horse-hoe ; and he ap- 

 plies to every acre, at the start, 600 pounds of 

 superphosphate and a less quantity in after years, 

 according to the crop. That this manure does 

 wonders on his farm is not to be doubted. We 

 have ourselves tried it several years, and always 

 with favoi'able results, some of which have been 

 published. We propose to continue our exper- 

 iments the present year with one ton of the ni- 

 trogenized superphosphate now on hand. 



And a word by the way upon this subject may 

 not be amiss. We do not believe that farmers 

 should in general purchase their manure, unless 

 they are selling their crops. If they are, they 

 must replace them by bringing on to the land 

 the elements of fertility which they have carried 

 away. This can only be done by buying some or 

 other of these fertilizers. Superphosphate of 

 lime is admitted everwhere to be, excepting gu- 

 ano, the very best of fertilizers, and guano is 

 difficult to apply properly, and is not adapted to 

 all crops. The best farmers in England buy im- 



