ROOT CULTURE 79 



ing or hilling process ; for the crop shou'.d receive 

 no farther earthing after the plants are in blossom, 

 when the stolens have shot forth, and the tubers be- 

 gan to form. Earthing after this time causes a new 

 set of stolens near the surface, and a growth of a 

 new set of tubers, which, in a measure, rob the ori- 

 ginal ones of their food. We have seen, by the ex- 

 periments quoted in raising early potatoes, that the 

 natural place for throwing out stolens, or roots 

 which produce the tubers, is the point of the stem 

 which first comes to the light and atmosphere ; that 

 if this point is covered in due time with two or three 

 inches of mould, stolens are protruded into it which 

 produce the potato ; but that, if this earth is wanting, 

 the stolens cannot protrude, but the potatoes grow 

 at the surface around the stem. After the earthing 

 process described, no farther care is required than 

 to destroy weeds, which may be done with the hoe, 

 or, if long omitted, by the hand. 



In harvesting the crop, although we have made 

 much progress in improvement, much remains to be 

 done. The hoe, the dung-fork, the spade, the po- 

 tato-hook, and the plough, followed by the harrow, 

 have each their several advocates. From our experi- 

 ence, we should choose the last first, and the first 

 last, where the crop is in drills ; and we should pre- 

 fer the hook where it is in hills. With the potato- 

 hook, when the crop has been in hills, we have 

 thrown out fourteen bushels of pink-eyes in an hour, 

 and twenty-seven bushels of the Rohan, though in 

 neither case did we gather the potatoes ; but in both 

 the digging process was thoroughly done. Lawson 

 & Son's potato lifter, figured and described in vol. 

 v., p. 114 of the Cultivator, seems to be calculated 

 to abridge the harvest labour of this crop. 



Sorting the crop. This is an economical process, 

 though little attended to, and may be more profitably 

 done before the crop is housed or pitted than after- 

 ward. There is a portion of the crop, often a fourth 



