218 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER 



JANUARY 18. 18!7. 



remain in tliai stiite alxnit a week, when tli« weeds 

 will hpijin to at)|>ear ; tlio ridgea are then earthed 

 U|>, and in a week or two as nuioh of the earth 

 from the sides of them is ploii^ljed down as can 

 be done without leaving the roots too bare. Af- 

 ter this the tojjs of the ridges are carefully hand- 

 hoed, and tlie earth which was ploun'ied from the 

 ridges is again turned to fhe.m : if afterwards wee<is 

 grow 11(1, they are again hand-hoed, after which 

 the earth is drawn up to the top of tlie ridires. 

 The p'ants having by this time got to a consider- 

 able size, soon overcome afl weeds, and conse- 

 quently require no further attention till the time 

 of taking up. It has, however, been justly ob- 

 served, tliat "on all very dry sands, and in a dry 

 climate, the land should be laid quite flat, and the 

 plants should be hoed by hand, .is the only means 

 of preserving the ground sufficiently moist to pro- 

 mote the growth of the crop ; but in every situa- 

 tion where there is no danger of the land being 

 too dry, and on all thin soils, one-bont ridges 

 have the advantage over every other method." 



Another mode — which it seems has been bor- 

 rowed from America — is to plunt the sets in banks. 

 "The field is marked out in shallow drills, at 

 about two feet and a half distance, by tlie double 

 nionld-board plough, and is then marked out 

 transversely at the same distance ; thus intersect- 

 ing the surface at right angles, and the dung is 

 laid at the time of planting. The holes for the 

 rece|ition of the sets are formed by a laborer at 

 the intersections marked by the plou^'h, in such a 

 manner as to leave them flat at t!ie bottom, about 

 ten ortrtelve inches in diameter, and three or four 

 inches deep. This being done, the manure is di- 

 vided into the holes as evenly as poss hie, taking 

 care that the particles be well separated by wo- 

 men and children breaking it with their hands. 

 Four cuts are then to be laid in each hoi ?, within 

 four inches of the edge, and about six or seven 

 inches distance, and covered by levelling the soil 

 into the holes with shovels, which finishes the 

 work until the plants appear above ground ; after 

 which, only a small quantity of earlh is thrown 

 lightly on the banks, just sufficient to refresh the 

 surface, and if the land be foul with weeds, it 

 should be hand-hoed before the bank.s are dressed. 

 The last earlhing should not be performed until 

 the crop is in full blossom, when it must get anoth- 

 er light dr ssing." 



Mr Burroughs, from whom we have extracted 

 the above account, says, that " many who have 

 heard of this culture, but who have not practised 

 it, imagine that its chief object is to afford a great 

 quantity of earth being thrown up to the plants ; 

 but so far from this being the scientific principle 

 of the system, that should the sets be deposited 

 too deep, or the banks be landed too high, the 

 crop would prove very unproductive." He adds 

 also, from his own experience, that " the banks 

 being left quite flat at the top when finished, the 

 crop proved much more productive than the ad- 

 joining diills sown with an equal quantity of ma- 

 nure, and the potatoes were ol' better quality." 



Regarding the mode of spreadins; the dung — 

 whether above or under the sets — some differ- 

 ence of opinion prevails; for although the latter 

 is the method usually adopted, and it may be ra- | 

 tioually supposed that, as the roots shoot rather 

 laterally than upwards, it is from the manure 

 placed underneath that they e.vtract their nutri- 

 ment, yet it is supposed by many persons that, if 

 the land be light and dry, it answers better to lay 



the manure in furrows above the plants; and 

 some fanners seem to think the manner of its ap- 

 plication immaterial. .According to an experi- 

 ment made with the utmo.st degree of attention, 

 under the direction of the Board of Agriculture, 

 the former, however, appeared to have the advan- 

 tage or five to four in its favor: the jirodiice of 

 an equal weight of sets, and quantity of nianure, 

 being — 



When laid over the dung, 105 lbs. 4 oz. 



•' under the dung, 84 lbs. 3 oz. 



Such are the ordinary modes of culture usually 

 adopted throughout most parts of the United 

 Kingdom ; but a novel plan, which deviates in 

 some essential particulars from those generally 

 einiiloyed, has lately been brought into notice by 

 Mr Knight, the very intelligent President of the 

 Horticultural Society ; and, as the very interest- 

 ing account which has been published by the so- 

 ciety may yet be unknown to many of our rea- 

 ders, we here transcribe it, and beg earnestly to 

 call it to the serious attention of every farmer who 

 is engaged in that branch of husbandry. 



"The experiments were made upon difl^erenl 

 varieties of potatoes ; but as the results were in 

 all cases nearly the same, I think that 1 shall most 

 readily cause the practice I recommend to be un- 

 derstood, by describing minutely the treatment o( 

 a single variety only, which I received from the 

 Horticultural Society, under the name of 'Lank- 

 man's Potato ;' " a tall sort raised some years 

 since in Flanders. 



" The soil in which I proposed to plant being 

 very shallow, and lying upon a rock, I collected 

 it with a plough into high ridges of (bur feet wide, 

 to give it an artificial depth. A deep furrow was 

 then made along the centre and highest part o( 

 each ridge ; and in the bottom of this, whole po- 

 tatoes, the lightest of which did not wei^h less 

 than four ounces, were deposited, at only six in- 

 ches distance from the centre of one to the cen- 

 tre cf another. Manure, in the ordinary quantity 

 was then introduced, and mould was added, suffi- 

 cient to cover the potatoes rather more deeply 

 than is generally done. 



" The stems of potatoes, as of other plants, rise 

 perpendicularly under the influence of their un- 

 erring guide, gravitation, so long as they continue 

 to be concealed beneath the .soil ; but as soon as 

 they rise above it, they are to a considerable ex- 

 tent, under the control of another agent, light. 

 Each inclines in whatever direction it receives the 

 greatest quantity of that fluid, and consequently 

 each avoids, and appears to shun, the shade of 

 every contiguous plant. The old tubers being 

 large, and, under the mode of culture recommen- 

 ded, rather deeply buried in the ground, the young 

 plants in the early part of the summer never suf- 

 fer from ft'ant of moisture ; and, being abundant- 

 ly nourished, they soon extend themselves in ev- 

 ery direction till they meet those of contiguous 

 rows, which they do not overshadow on account 

 of the width of the intervals. 



"The stems being abundantly fed, owing to the 

 size of the old tubers, rise from the ground with 

 great strength and luxuriance, support well their 

 foliage, and a larger breadth of this, I think, ex- 

 posed to the light -during the whole season, than 

 under any other mode of culture which I have 

 seen ; and, as the plants acquire a very large size 

 early in the summer, the tubers, ot even very late 

 varieties, arrive at a stale of perfect maturity ear- 

 ly in the autumn. 



" Having found my cro|is of potatoes to he in 

 the last three years, during which alone I have 

 accurately adopted the mo<le of culture described 

 above, much greater than they had ever previous- 

 ly been, as well as of excellent qna'ity, I was led 

 to ascertain the amount in weight which an .acre 

 of ground, such as 1 have described — the soil of 

 which was naturally poor and shallow — would 

 produce. A colony of rabbits had, however in 

 the List year done a good deal of damage, and 

 pheasants had eaten many of the tubers which the 

 rabbits had exposed to view ; but the remaining 

 produce per acre exceeded 539 bushels, of 82 lbs. 

 being allowed in every bushel on accoimt of a 

 very small quantity of earth which adhered to 

 them. 



" The preceding experiments were made with 

 a large and produi'tive variety of potato only ; but 

 [ am inclined to think that I have raised, and 

 shall laise the present year, nearly as large a pro- 

 duce per acre of a very well-known small early 

 variety — the < ash-leaved kidney potato.' Of 

 this 1 selected in the present spring the largest 

 tubers which I could cause to be produced in the 

 last year; and I have planted them nearly in con- 

 tact with each other in the rows, and with inter- 

 vals, on account of the shortness of their stems, 

 of oidy two feet between the rows. The ])lants 

 at present display an unusual degree of strength 

 and vigor of growth, arising from the very large 

 size — for that variety — of the planted tubers; 

 and as large a breadth ot foliage is exposed to the 

 light by the small, as could be exposed by a large 

 variety ; for I have always found the amount of 

 the produce, under any given circumstance, to be 

 regulated by the extent of foliage which was ex- 

 posed to light ; and I have uniformly found that 

 to obtain crops of potatoes of great weight and 

 excellence, the period of planting should never 

 be later than the beginning of March." 



The produce of this small early variety in fact, 

 very considerably excetded that of the large one 

 first mentioned — being ))er acre 665 bushels of 

 82 pounds — and both so far exceeded the ordi- 

 nary crops which had been previously raised, ex- 

 cept in very rare cases, that doubts were enter- 

 tained of the exactness of Mr Knight's conclusions 

 and exficriments, it will be seen, were made in the 

 garden of the society in order to obtain funher 

 evidence. 



SEED. 



It has been ascertained by repeated trials that 

 every variety of the potato, when profiagated dur- 

 ing a series eilher from the root, or by the 

 whole tubers, is subject to degenerate : in some, 

 the quality remaining good, after the produce in 

 quantity has become defective, whilst with oth- 

 ers, it disappears with the vigor of the plant. In 

 order to obviate this incouvenience, and to pre- 

 serve those species which are known to be valua- 

 ble, farmers occasionally raise them from the seed • 

 contained in the apples which grow upon the 

 stalk ; for which [lurpose, a few large ripe apples 

 should be chosen from a healthy plant, and he 

 carefully preserved apart, in some dry sand, dur- 

 ing the winter. 



The seed is then picked out, and usually sown 

 in rich garden ground in the month of April; but 

 it is more expedient to sow it in a hot-bed early 

 in March, to expose the shoots gradually to the 

 open air, and to plant them in a bed of rich earth 

 in the middle of May. In the month of October, 

 these seedlings would produce tubers, the largest 



