48 THE FARM. 



grasp the lower handle with the hand, then, holding the pan close np to the 

 vines and near the gi'ound, with a crooked stick, like the one represented, 

 gather the vines over the pan, giving them a smart shake against the shield 

 and over the pan. A good, active man, with this contrivance, can ' bug ' 

 an acre of potatoes effectively in two hours." 



The Potato Disease. — There are many devices suggested for avoiding 

 the disease known as potato rot. There is one made by an English writer, 

 who says it has been found that " by hilling the plants iip very high as 

 soon as the blight appears, the spores are prevented in a great measure 

 from being washed down by the rains, and the rot consequently much di- 

 minished. It was found that although the spores were readily washed 

 downward through one or two inches of earth, they very rarely reached a 

 depth of five inches. The experiment was repeated many times with the 

 uniform result that where the plants were not hilled up, and the tubers lay 

 but one or two inches deep, the percentage of rot was very large. But 

 where the tubers were covered to the depth of five inches, the damage from 

 the disease was inconsiderable." If a physician were to say to a patient 

 having the small-pox that if the lower part of the body were swathed in 

 Avet sheets the disease would not get down to the legs and feet, it would be 

 a parallel suggestion to this. The rot is a disease which infects the whole 

 plant. It has been found that when the disease began in the tops at a late 

 stage of the growth, mowing off the diseased tops saved the tubers. This is 

 something hke amputating a gangrened limb to save the body, and is a rea- 

 sonable remedy. But the spores are not always, and are in fact rarely, ripe 

 at the season of growth, and are generally in the soil and infect the plant 

 from the roots. The tubers are not roots, but stems, and receive the infec- 

 tion from the roots when the source of it is in the soil. When the leaves are 

 infected by spores, carried in the air from distant fields, where they have re- 

 mained dui-ing the resting season, the disease spreads through the tissues 

 of the plant and reaches the tubers in that way, from within, and not from 

 without. The spores are not free until the plant decays, being set free by 

 the decomposition of the diseased tissues. This being distinctly known, it 

 becomes of the greatest importance to destroy the infected vines by burning 

 them, and thtis preventing the soil from infection by the matured spores in 

 the leaves and stems. Earthing up the potatoes might possibly have helped 

 to preserve the tubers from the disease by remo\-iug the water from the 

 saturated soil; this water being injurious to the plant and producing all the 

 conditions favorable to the spread of the disease. A more healthful condi- 

 tion of the plants would tend to prevent this unhealthful condition and con- 

 fine the disease to the leaves and stems, and save the tubers. But every 

 one who has had diseased potatoes, knows that tubers, apparently soTind 

 when dug, will rot in the cellar. This is because the disease is already in 

 them when they are dug, and develops in them in the course of time from 

 the infection. Earthing up cannot save them then, nor can it at any other 

 timt excepting through its influence in the way wc have pointed out. But 

 here, where our seasons are not so wet, it would not avail us as it might the 

 farmers of sodden England or Scotland or Ireland, where " the rain it rain- 

 eth every day," more or less. This diflference of climate is very important to 

 be remembered when considering such matters as this from an English view. 



Metliods of Raising Potatoes. — There is, writes a practical farmer, a 

 great variety of opinion in regard to raising potatoes, size of seed, and culti- 



