374 



Top-Dressing. — Subsoil Ploughing. 



Vol. V 



For the Farmers' Cabinet. 

 On Top-Dressingr. 



Mr. Editor, — When I first read the arti- 

 cle at page 84 of the present vohime of the 

 Cabinet, on Top-dressing-, I thought indeed 

 that it was all t/ieori, as my friend and neigh- 

 Lour Parnell calls it, and was astonished that 

 any one could advocate a doctrine so foreign 

 to all our past experience, and in the very 

 teeth of every work on agriculture, all of 

 which inculcate the absolute necessity of 

 keeping our dunghills covered with earth, to 

 prevent the escape of the gases, and the loss 

 of about one-half the value of the manure; 

 and upon spreading, to turn it in immediate- 

 ly, for the same best of all reasons: and, as 

 I say, I did heartily despise the notion of top- 

 dressing, much as your correspondent A, had 

 to say in its behalf. This was in the autumn 

 of last year, and up to February of the pre- 

 sent spring, I had not changed one jot of my 

 opinion or lost an atom of my prejudice; but, 

 turning again by chance to the article, as I 

 sat by the fire-side one cold and comfortless 

 evening, when I had leisure to examine and 

 reflect upon what he had advanced five 

 months before, a thought struck me, that I 

 could try for myself the truth or error of the 

 scheme, and that I ought to do so, for the 

 benefit of those who had it not in their power 

 to make the experiment so easily as I could ; 

 and I therefore came to tlie resolution to give 

 the thing a fair trial and report upon it in the 

 Cabinet, which I am now prepared to do. 



In the upper part of one of my fields I 

 have a gravelly bank with scarcely two inches 

 of mould upon it; there the crop, of whatever 

 kind, had always been poor, even after the 

 most careful cultivation — the hungry subsoil 

 permitting whatever dressing was buried in 

 it, quickly to pass away : I therefore ploughed 

 it as deep as I was able, and immediately 

 Fowed upon it a portion of oats; I planted 

 Lima beans on another portion, as also some 

 of the emur, mentioned in the late pages of 

 the Cabinet, and immediately covered the 

 surface with the sweepings of the streets, to 

 ihe thickness of an inch or an inch and a 

 half, and "said notliing to nobody," as I was 

 fearful my neighbours would have enjoyed a 

 laugh at my expense, had they seen me ex- 

 pose a coat of manure "to be dissipated by 

 the winds of heaven," &c. This was late in 

 the month of April, and on this, the 20th day 

 of June, I find upon this hitherto worthless 

 portion of my land, crops that far surpass any 

 tliat I have ever grown on land of ten times 

 its value, and which have borne the late 

 drought without flinching in the least. On 

 turning up the dung, I find the earth under- 

 neath always moist — it seems to operate as a 

 sponge, to hold the evaporation which rises 



from the subsoil, and to prevent its escape ; 

 and the weeds which were indigenous to the 

 soil, appear not to have vegetated, but are 

 kept in abeyance by the heavy crops with 

 which the ground is covered. I need not say 

 that I visit very often my experimental plot, 

 and am more and more convinced of the su- 

 perior value of top-dressing, on such soils at 

 least, and am free to confess that my mind is 

 now open to conviction. On the most care- 

 ful examination, I cannot perceive that the 

 coat of manure is at all lessened in bulk by 

 either the rains or exposure; but I can per- 

 ceive that a shower, which carries the water 

 impregnated with the dung to the roots of 

 the plants, causes them to start away in a 

 most remarkable manner — indeed the imme- 

 diate efi^ect is surprising. I am, therefore, so 

 far as the present experiment has taught me, 

 convinced of the great advantage of top- 

 dressing: will others try it] I am preparing 

 to sow beet after rye, and shall cover the 

 rows where the seeds are sown, with well- 

 rotted street manure as a top-dressing, in- 

 stead of burying it in the rows, as heretofore 

 directed, and have no fear of obtaining a good 

 crop. John Kinson. 



To the Editor of the Farmers' Cabinet. 

 Subsoil Ploughing. 



I HAVE for a number of years been en- 

 gaged in the pursuits of agriculture, but be- 

 ing taught in the "old school," to believe 

 that any variation from the beaten track of 

 the farmers of Chester county, two-score 

 years ago, was any thing but commendable 

 — namely, one undeviating course, first a 

 crop of corn, then oats, then wheat and 

 grasses, with the application of what little 

 manure chanced to be lodged in the barn- 

 yard during the winter season, — these, with 

 a few garden vegetables, have seemed to em- 

 brace our whole round of farming operations, 

 ever since. 



But having recently become a reader of 

 the Farmers' Cabinet, and witnessed the 

 beneficial results produced by the experi- 

 ments made and making, both in the use of 

 improved implements of husbandry, and in 

 the diflferent and much improved modes of 

 culture described and recommended therein, 

 I have determined to rid myself of those pre- 

 judices under which I have been labouring, 

 and endeavour to profit by the experience 

 and experiments of the agriculturists of the 

 present day. And having read in a late 

 number of the Cabinet, an article on garden- 

 ing, in which the writer earnestly recom- 

 mends a system of subsoil cultivation, and 

 points out the very beneficial results which 

 would be sure to follow therefrom ; and hav- 

 ing had but poor success myself in gardening 



