No. 114] 209 



•of the mode propjsed by Mr. Roberts ; for while in some parts of 

 the country, salt, potash, charcoal, muck, and a variety of other 

 things seemed to arre^t the disease, in others they have proved 

 entirely inefficient. The mammoth nutmeg potato, however, has 

 never been diseased. I have seen them growing in the same rows 

 with other kinds, all of which have decayed, while the mammoth 

 outmeg refused to receive the disease, even when in immediate 

 ■contact with the vulnerable source. 



Manures. — The manures proper for potatoes, and that of all 

 other crops, should first be of such ingredients as analysis shows 

 to be absent from or deficient in quantity in the soil, and which 

 the analysis of the potato shows to be necessary for its growth; 

 but in soils fairly in balance, where large crops are required, 

 some manures may be used for potatoes which are nearly or quite 

 inert when applied to other crops ; thus freshly dug muck taken 

 from salt marshes, and thrown into drills underlaying seed pota- 

 toes, will be found to be an efficient manure, while the decompo- 

 sition of this muck, consequent upon the abstraction of some of 

 its constituents by the roots of the growing potato prepare it for 

 minute division in the soil by the next year's plowing, and thus 

 sandy soils may be made to yield large crops of potatoes, at the 

 same time providing themselves with the conditions which will 

 render them retentive of manures for all time. One member, 

 Mr. Charles Dennison, President of the Grocers' Bank, raised last 

 year 300 bushels of carter potatoes on an acre, by the use of the 

 improved super- phosphate of lime, and this manure, combined with 

 charcoal dust, is the only manure I have used for many years for 

 the growing of this crop, during which time I have not had the 

 disease in any kind of potato which I have raised, and this has 

 included most of the known kinds. In Monmouth county, N. J., 

 the potato crop is large, many farmers appropriating 100 acres to 

 its growth, and many of them raising the common merino potato. 

 This yields more largely than any other, except the Rohan, and 

 although poor in quality during fall and winter, is valuable for 

 early spring use, and from the high price potatoes have borne 

 this spring, some of those farmers have rendered themselves 

 wealthy by a single crop. 



[Assembly No. 14 A. j N 



