CULTURE AND CURING IN NORTH CAROLINA. 113 



* 



Reports sliowa general average of 33 per ceut. of preferred tobacco soils cultivated, aud the proportion of now 

 lauds is reported at 45 per cent. In Buncombe and Madison counties, in the west, where tobacco culture has been 

 recently introduced, the proportion of new lands is 80 per cent., and the general average proportion of uncleared lauds 

 adapted to the plant is given as 58 per ceut. Since tine tobacco lauds are precisely those which farmers would 

 avoid clearing for other crops, this is probably too low rather than too high an estimate. 



THE TIMBEE GBOWTH. 



The forest growths are found upon soils of such diverse character, and coincide over such wide areas, that it 

 can only be said generally that hickories, white oaks, the tulip-tree, walnuts, maples, sugar maples, and beeches 

 are indications of good land, and post oak, scrub oak, black-jack, chestnut, chincapin, pine, and whortleberry are 

 indications of poor land; but either of these growths may be found upon lands better suited to the other to such 

 a large extent that one must judge by the predominance of species and by the character rather than by the kind 

 of growth, and especially by the undergrowth. The timber test for land is of little use to the inexperienced, while 

 it is of great value to the experienced eye. 



ROLLING AND LEVEL LANDS. 



With regard to the "lay of the land", planters generally report no difference between rolling and level lands, 

 provided the latter are well drained. If not well drained, the level land makes a heavier product, which does not 

 ripen so well or so early, on account of excess of moisture. 



PREPARATION OF THE SOIL. 



In the preparation of tobacco lands methods vary with the character of the soils, old "sedge" lands, clover 

 fallows, and stubble lauds requiring more plowing than land last cultivated in corn or tobacco. 



New ground is coltered twice or ofteuer, and is cleared of roots and trash; lot lands are plowed in autumn or 

 in early winter, to obtain the help of the winter frosts in reducing the soil to fine tilth, are again plowed early 

 in the spring, and a third time before planting. Turuing-plows are used to a depth of from 2 to 5 inches, the object 

 being to invert the upper soil as deeply as possible without exposing the subsoil. 



If the laud is trashy, or uot iu thorough tilth, it is dragged with a heavy harrow after the last plowing. It is 

 then bedded up by throwing from two to four furrows together with a turning-plow, and the hills are laid off from 

 -i to 3 feet 3 inches apart and patted on the top, so as to compact the soil where the plant is to be set. Hilling is 

 strongly recommended by the best planters, especially in wet seasons, affording better drainage aud protection 

 against all the wet- weather diseases of tobacco. Hills present a flat surface of from 10 to 15 inches iu diameter, and 

 are made when the ground is iu good order for working. If too dry, it will require too much rain to moisten them 

 sufiicieutly ; if too wet, they will bake. In uew grouud the hills may be made iu March or April; in old ground they 

 are to be made late enough to avoid danger of growing up in weeds aud grass before plantiug, not earlier than the 

 first of May. Listing or bedding up by 3 or 4 furrows of a turuiug-plow saves labor in making hills. 



There is a wide difference of opinion and of practice as to the proper distance between plants, varying from 2 by 

 2 feet 3 inches to 3 feet 3 inches by 3 feet 3 inches. Many hold that nothing is gained in aggregate weight, while 

 something is lost in length, breadth, aud body by crowding closer than 3 feet 3 inches apart each way. Hills are 

 generally made by measuring or stepping off one row and placing the hills of the next opposite the center of the 



space between those in the first, and so on, in quincunx order. 



f 



TOBACCO FERTILIZERS. 



Both commercial fertilizers and home-made manures are used : of the former, special tobacco fertilizers and 

 Peruvian guano; of the latter, chiefly stable manure. Stable manure is used in connection with numerous commercial 

 fertilizers guano, superphosphates, and special compounds prepared for tobacco. 



In the eastern tobacco counties no attempt is made to raise tobacco without fertilizers and manures; in the 

 western counties planters are farming a virgin soil and using very little manure; and the policy of clearing new to 

 replace old lands promises to go on until it has wrought the ruin it has elsewhere. It is generally agreed that upon 

 most lands in the west two crops can be raised without manure, aud this is generally the limit. 



The use of fertilizers is said to yellow the crop in the hill as well as to increase the yield, and they are applied 

 broadcast in the hill and in drills. The practice of placing them in the drills possesses advantages every way. The 

 most approved method is to apply stable manure in the winter. A furrow is opened, in which it is placed, according 

 to the character of the soil, and a furrow is thrown over it. In the spring the center of this is divided with a 

 bull-tongue or shovel-plow, and the commercial fertilizer is placed in the new furrow with the stable manure, a bed 

 being thrown over this by three or four furrows with a turning-plow. In this way the soil of the bed becomes 

 thoroughly permeated by the fertilizer and manure, and upon this bed the hills are made at the proper time, the 



707 



