NEW ENOIiAND FARMER. 



Published by John B. Russeli,, at JVo. 52 JVorth Market Street, (at the Agricultural Warehouse) Thomas G. Fessenden, Editor. 



VOL. YIII. 



BOSTON, FRIDAY, JNOVEMBER 13, 1829. 



No. 17. 



AGRICULTURE. 



II. The following fifteen experiments are exactly the 

 same as tlio forjiier with the addition only of a shovel 

 full of ^ood barn manure to each iiill. 



FOR THE NEW ENGLAND FARMEIU.- 



ON POTATOES. 



Mr Fessende.v — Your correspondent, Mr P. 



IRE, in reply to the queries of " No Tlieorist," 



detailed some e.\periinents on Potatoes. One 

 t in every art or science is worth many conjec- 

 es, however i)lausible ; and the pubHc should 

 grateful to any intelligent farmer, who will ex- 

 ile with exactness any valuable experiment and 

 nmunicate the result for the benefit of others, 

 avc thought, while the subject is particularly 

 ore their attention, that the agricultural public 



lit be gratified with the result of some experi- 

 nts on this subject, conducted with apparently 

 at exactness by a gentleman, who chose to 

 :hhohl his name from the public, and printed in 



3d volume of the Memoirs of the Mass. Agr. 

 ;iety, page 322. I have therefore transcribed 

 i now forward them to you, to use as you may 

 !ni best. 



Yours, respectfully. 

 Oct. 26, 1829. H. C. 



So wide a difference of opinion exists among 

 h scientific and merely practical farmers, as to 



quantity of seed necessary to produce the best 

 p of potatoes, I had determined to make an ex- 

 iment on this subject. For this purpose I se- 

 ted a piece of sandy loam, incumbent on a sub- 

 itum of sand, the whole ground as near alike a? 

 quality as possible ; and now enclose you the 

 ult of forty experiments. The^e experiments 

 re made under my immediate inspection, there- 

 e I can answer for their correctness." 

 Dated Dover, .V. H. April 8, 1815. 



Result of fifteen experiments made at Dover, 

 N'ew Hampshire, A. D. 1S13, of seeding Fota- 

 oes, consisting of 20 hills — the rows 3 feet 

 ipart, hills 2 feet, tvithout any manure, on sandy 

 oam tliat had been two years planted. 



88 01 775 



III. Result of ten experiments of seeding Potatoes, 20 

 hills each, manured with a small handful of Rock 

 weed.* 



63 2 1 534 

 The foregoing experiments prove, what all ex- 

 perienced farmers were convinced of, that poor 

 land requires more seed in all kinds of crops, than 

 that under a high state of cultivation. 



N. B. A bushel of potatoes weighs 56 to 58 

 pounds. 



The potato used for seed in the above described 

 experiments was the large blue. 



when it shall bo deemed nearer a minimum than a 

 iiiiiximuiii produce. 



The produce in Flanders is rated in many cases 

 at ten tops and one-sixth, by the English acre. 

 LouuoN rates tho produce at from five to eight, 

 and sometimes ten and twelve tons to an acre, 

 at forty bushels to a ton, as the highest jiroduce 

 known in England. 



S. G. Perki.ns, Esq. obtained '• from siiiiety-four 

 sets, each set containing one, two, or three ejes, 

 planted in drills, 255 lbs. of large handsome pota- 

 toes, fit for table use, and 18 lbs. of small ones, 

 making an aggregate of 273 lbs. from one lb. and 

 two ounces, or 242 lbs. for one. This, accord- 

 ing to the extent of ground planted, at 60 ])Ounds 

 to a bushel, is a little over 1200 Inishels to an 

 acre."* 

 Samuel Lathrop, of West Springfield, in 1817. 



raised on an acre more than 618 bushels. 



He had no doubt that a part of the giound 

 yeilded at the rate of 700 bushels. 

 Payson Williams of Fitchburg, in 1818, raised 



on an acre, 498 bush. 



Denms Stebbins, of Deerfield, do. in 



1819, 612 " 



Payson Williams, of Fitchburg, do in 



1810, 580 " 



Do. do. in 1820, 614 ' 



Do. do. in 1821, 551.^^ ' 



John Dwinell, of Balem, do. in 1821, 518 " 



A few rods of my own ground, this year, I 

 found by measurement, produced at the rate of 

 412 busliels to an acre. These were of the Long 

 Red potatoes, and were not better thaji some other 

 parts of my field, though they were planted mere- 

 ly as an experiment, according to direction.s given 

 in a recent number of the British Farmer's Mag- 

 azine, in deep trenches, well manured, and the 

 earth which was thrown out, gradually returned 

 as they grew, until the surface was levelled. This 

 mode of planting, though highly recommended, 

 was expensive of time and labor, and not, upon 

 the whole, to be chosen. The size of potatoes 

 tUis year, with me, is uncommonly large, as from a 

 crop of more than fifteen hundred bushels, the 

 amount of small, worm eaten, sunburnt, and refuse, 

 does not exceed 180 busliels, and many of these, 

 in ordinary years, would be. deemed marketable. 



Od.26, 1829. H. C. 



FOR THK NEW ENGI.ANf FARMER. 



AMOUNT OF P,OTATO CROPS. 



Dr Anderson says, that he has raised of good 

 marketable potatoes, at the rate of more than thirty 

 tons weight from a Scotch acre of ground, (the 

 Scotch is to the English acre, as five to four, Bear- 

 ly.) Col. Pickering says, a bushel of potatoes 

 will weigh 66 pounds. Dr A.'s crop, then, is at 

 the rate of more than 814 bushels to an English 

 acre. He conceives, that in the state of knowledge 

 respecting the cultivation at that time, (1798) thir- 

 ty tons from an English acre may be considered 

 as the maximum produce; but in his excursive 

 and brilliant imagination, he anticipates the time 



*FucU3 of Lin. much used as a manure for raising 

 corn on sandy plains in this vicinity. (Dover, N. H.) 



NOTES AND OBSERVATIONS ON THE 



VINE. 



Hon. H. a. S. Dearborn, 



Pres. Mass. Hort. Sociel/. 



The dravvingf which I now forward you, t;!- 

 gether with the mode of training the vine prac- 

 tised at Thoniery, has already been accurately 

 described by a highly distinguished member of the 

 Horticultural and Agricultural Societies of Massa- 

 chusetts. [See New England Farmer, vol. vi. |>. 

 73, 118, and 121.] It is a translation from a cel- 

 ebrated work which has been annually published 

 at Paris for the last 66 years with continued im- 

 provements. 



In that work, this mode of training and pruning, 



*See his letter — Mass. Memoirs of Agr. vol. iii. p. 328. 

 t This drawing is to be seen atthe Hall of the Massa- 

 chusetts Horticultural Society. 



