1851. 



THE GENESEE FARMER. 



157 



sprin2"> it should be well harrowed, to prevent exces- 

 sive drying. Mr. Wm. CGrada', of Southborough, 

 says "he had not rot in his potatoes last season, and 

 he ascribes it to his mode of treatment. He put one 

 hundred loads of peat ou each acre of his land in the 

 fall I'reviouR, and last spring he planted, and put a sho- 

 velful of peat ashes to each hill. He did not have 

 a heavy crop, but had ab^ut 150 bushels to the acre. 

 Moi-e trials may be necessary to determine whether 

 peat aslies in the hill are an infalliable preventive of 

 the rot." 



In 1847, a correspondent of the Agriculturist 

 makes the following remarks on the renovation of 

 the potato,as it is termed. He says, "A potato that 

 will not produce more than 150 bushel to the acre 

 is not worth the farmer's attentio:i, much less if it be 

 in a diseased state ; and, iu my opjnion, the old po- 

 tato is not worth redemption from disease, even if it 

 could be effected. The world I conceive is in imme- 

 diate want of new varieties — new from their origin, 

 from their seed — new in quality and productiveness. 

 Such potatoes have been produced, and are in ad- 

 vance of the old crop in every important particular. 

 They are cultivated by several persons in Europe, as 

 well as in this country." 



A gentlemen in Germany, near Hamburgh, says 

 he practied raising potatoes from seed for fifteen 

 years, and obtained splendid varieties, which are not 

 attacked with disease. I have known the same 

 method to be practiced, and through my own obser- 

 vation relative to experiments and facts, T am fully 

 convinced that this is the true course to pursue. 



I know of some who intend to plant large quanti- 

 ties from the seed of seedlings this season. Those 

 who wish to improve their seed, and prevent the rot, 

 should gather seed from the balls which grow on the 

 vine in great abundance. Half an ounce of seed will 

 plant a quarter of an acre. Those who try this pro- 

 cess will find every, year's experiment will bring the 

 tuber and its seed in advance of its former condition. 

 Charles W. Hobart. — YatesviUe, J\'. Y., 1851. 



S. W.'S NOTES FOR THE MONTH. 



Draimng-Tile and Draining. — An editorial request 

 is made in the June Farmer that some one in Seneca 

 county would give the price of tile, and cost of laying 

 them. Whartenby's price for both pipe and tile, 

 delivered at the Canal or Railroad depot at Waterloo, 

 is as follows : 



2 inch Pipe $10 per 1000 



U " " ■ -- 9 " " 



4 inch Tile 15 " " 



3 " " ' - 12 " '• 



2 " " 10 " " 



Thirteen and a half pipe, o? tile make a rod ; hence, 

 it costs 13J cts. to lay one rod of two inch pipe' or 

 tile after the ditch is dug. The expense of digging 

 a ditch three feet deep, depends on the soil and the 

 presence or absence of stone, hard pan, k,c. Here is 

 an Irishman who has followed ditching in Dryden, 

 Tompkins Co., who says that the price of digging 

 Mind ditch there, was "two shillings a rod, and board- 

 ed ;" the digging was fourteen inches wide on top, 

 ten at the bottom, and two and a half feet deep. He 

 thinks that ditching in this county can be done much 

 cheaper than in Tompkins, as here there is compara- 

 tively no stone or hard pan, and consequently the pick 

 may be dispenced with. In laying pipe, the last six 

 inches in depth may be made very easily, and at little 



expense, by the aid of a pointed or graduated spade. 

 Where tile is laid, a thin board to place them on is 

 found to be much better, and more stable, than the 

 short, earthen, often warped, shoes ; but where the 

 bottom is hard, no shoeing is necessary ; the two 

 iiich pipe, hov/ever, is now generally preferred to the 

 horse- shoe tile. 



The advantages derived from-draining, were never 

 more apparent than at this wet and backward se^.son. 

 Indian corn may now be seen ten inches high, grocn 

 and thrifty, on an under-drained field, while in every 

 other location it is of a sickly yellow. The nearer 

 the drains are together, the better, as draining by ta- 

 king off the excess of water, keeps botli surface and 

 Eubsoil friable, and enables it to absorb by capillary 

 attraction all necessary moisture. Whartenby has 

 already sold his large stock of ready baked tile, but 

 as he is soon to set up one of Purdies' improved ma- 

 chines, he can fill all orders after the 20th of July. 



Plaster. — F. Williams asks whether plaster 

 when plowed in, is useful to vegetation. On the 

 highlands of Chatauque, where there is no limestone, 

 plaster may become a substitute for carbonate of lime 

 in the soil. But Liebig tells us that the great value 

 of gypsum, and other salts of lime,' is in the fixed 

 condition they give to ammonia in the soil • hence 

 the value of gypsum when mixed with the uecompo- 

 sing manure of the stables, in the open air ; when 

 dissolved by water, its sulpliur unites with the esca- 

 ping ammonia, changing its nature from a volatile 

 escaping carbonate to a sulphate, "in which fixed 

 state not a particle of it is lost to growing plants." 

 — Liebig's Ag. Chem., page 53. But as it takes 

 four hundred times its weight of water to dissolve 

 gypsum into a form to be decomposed by the carbo- 

 nate of ammonia, it should always be sown in winter 

 or early in the spring, to benefit the crop of the 

 season. 



Some writers have supposed that Liebig gives too 

 much importance to plaster as manure, because its 

 action is not everywhere perceptible, like that of ani- 

 mal manures. On the sea-coast it has no beneficial 

 eflfect, and many practical farmers in the interior, 

 contend that it has no effect on some growing crops. 

 But it is sufficient that plaster does produce, in cer- 

 tain situations, all the effects he has ascribed to it. 

 The day is not yet when man is permitted to unravel, 

 or even account for all Nature's mysteries. 



The Difficulties of Chemical Analysis. — It 

 has been asserted by some chemists, that spring wa- 

 ter is entirely free from the carbonate of ammonia ; 

 but Liebig says that the super-carbonate of lime in 

 spring water liberates the ammonia, and it is lost in 

 the air in the process of analysis. In the same manner, 

 many of other volatile substances are lost. Boussino- 

 AULT, in treating on the properties of milk, says that 

 the chemical composition of milk varies very little 

 when the cow's food is changed, and that " chemistry 

 is powerless in detecting tlie volatile principles which 

 give the agreeable tiavor to milk and butter." 



The Season and thp; Crops. — The season, thus 

 far, is wet, cool, and backward, although we have 

 had no injurious late frosts. Hay promises to be a 

 large crop ; wheat looks well ; it is rather wet for 

 barley, oats, and corn, unless it is on well drained, 

 well manured fields. Farmers begin to talk much 

 about under-draining- ; they see its magical effects 

 at this particular time, and none but him who is deter- 

 mined to die game in the slough of traditionary prac- 

 tice, can resist occular proofs, however faitiiless they 



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