1860. 



NEW ENGLAND FARMEE. 



445 



ought to be coming forward rapidly. But by com 

 posting the super[)hosphate with muck, it is so 

 diffused and absorbed by the muck that the com- 

 post is in a state to nourish the tender roots at 

 once, and send the plant forward with a rapid and 

 healthy growth, giving it a remarkably deep green 

 color. Then, too, the muck is sweetened and mod- 

 ified by the superphosphate, and furnishes a little 

 fine vegetable food to nourish the corn in the fore 

 part of the season, as well as makes a little mel- 

 low place for the roots to expand in. I can have 

 no doubt, after what I have observed this year and 

 last, but what if superphosphate is to be used in 

 the hill for corn, it will pay well to mix it with 

 old dry pulverized muck, in such proportions as 

 to allow about a tablespoonful of superphosphate 

 ■with about a pint of muck to each hill. The com- 

 post should be made a week or two previous to 

 use, mixing it in a shed, or the barn floor, aiid 

 keeping it under cover till used, and freeing the 

 muck from lumps, sticks, &c., before mixing. If 

 muck is not conveniently to be had, rich loam, or 

 fine rotten mould from the woods, may be used 

 with good effect. 



Four or five years ago, Mr. Bradley purchased 

 3. tract of thirty or forty acres of old worn-out 

 "plain land," and has from year to year since been 

 bringing it, say eight or ten acres each year, into 

 high cultivation. This year, he is redeeming the 

 last portion of it, about two acres, from its sterile 

 state, and has it in two fields of perhaps the very 

 largest and best corn I have anywhere seen this 

 season. The surface-soil of this plain had been 

 quite exhausted by a long course of shallow plov/- 

 ing and close cropping with winter rye, as fre- 

 quently repeated as the land would bear six or 

 eight bushels of grain per acre. The soil had been 

 so skinned to the depth of four or five inches, that 

 ten acres of it would not support one cow decent- 

 ly through the summer — indeed, there was noth- 

 ing of any value growing on it, after about the 

 middle of July each year. The growth last year on 

 the land which is now covered with such stout 

 corn, was occasional sweet-ferns, mulleins, shrub 

 pines, with here and there a few feeble poverty- 

 stricken grasses. 



This tract of land has however one important 

 redeeming quality. Underlying the shallow-plowed 

 and worn-out surface, there comes a fine-grained, 

 salvy, unctuous subsoil, in texture between a 

 sandy and * clay loam, which, when brought to 

 the surface by deep plowing, exposed to atmo- 

 spheric influence and mingled with compost ma- 

 nure, becomes a very active and desirable soil for 

 tillage purposes, one which stands dry weather 

 well, and does not bake or become hard and crust- 

 ed over in a wet season. When first brought to 

 the surface, it is of a pale yellow color, but by ex- 

 posure to the air and to cultivation, soon changes 

 to a good deep brown. The unctuous quality of 

 this subsoil, as it is taken in hand and worked by 

 one's fingers, does not exist in the surface-soil ; 

 that is gritty, and crumbles in loose particles ; 

 while the subsoil is soft and waxy. Mr. Bradley 

 early determined that his best chances for speedi- 

 ly converting this tract into productive tillage 

 land, lay in bringing up and cultivating the sub- 

 soil ; and accordingly each portion of the plain 

 when taken in hand for tillage, has been plowed 

 deep at once. 



In November last, the portions now in corn 



were plowed with the sod and subsoil plow, ten 

 to twelve inches deep. In May last, the plowed 

 land was manured with forty ox-cart loads of com- 

 post to each acre, about thirty-five bushels to each 

 load, made of about equal parts each of muck and 

 stable manure. The compost was plowed in, four 

 to five inches deep, with a light, sharp plow, 

 guaged to the proper depth by a roller on the 

 beam. The manure was thus placed where the 

 mellow soil closed all around it, absorbing and 

 holding its goodness, and yet keeping it near 

 enough to the atmosphere to undergo a speedy 

 and fertilizing decomposition, and where it is 

 readily available to the growing crop in all stages 

 of its progress. 



After plowing in the manure, the field was light- 

 ly harrowed, then marked off each way in rows 

 three and a half feet apart, a tablespoonful of su- 

 perphosphate was dropped in each hill, and the 

 corn planted, covering the superphosphate well 

 with earth before dropping the seed. The corn 

 came up well, and has been twice hoed, using the 

 cultivator each way between the rows, at each 

 hoeing. The corn at this time is of vei-y large 

 growth and splendid color, the great lusty ears 

 standing out in every direction, presenting a 

 striking contrast with the vegetation standing on 

 the same land one year ago — indeed, one wonders 

 at the change, as he realizes how great it is, and 

 he is struck with what the art of man can do in 

 the improvement of land, when rightly directed. 

 The present crop of corn — accidents before har- 

 vest excepted — will fully pay every expense that 

 has been laid out on the land on which it stands, 

 leaving a greatly improved field, for the produc- 

 tion of good crops for several years to come. 



The other portions of this tract of land have 

 been treated in precisely the same way as that 

 above described, so that now the whole has been 

 brought from a sterile, unsightly barren, to hand- 

 some, smiling fields of grain and grass. The first 

 portion, deeply plowed, highly manured, and 

 planted with corn three years ago, is now in mow- 

 ing, producing a good quality and quantity of 

 grass. The next portion, in corn last year, was 

 sown with oats, and stocked to grass this season. 

 The men are now harvesting the oats, and the 

 crop is very stout, and the catch of grass perfect 

 — showing the excellent qualities of this upturned 

 and cultivated subsoil for resisting drought and 

 taking grass kindly ; for at sowing-time, we had 

 hereabouts very dry weather, which lasted well 

 into June. Preparatory to sowing the oats, the 

 land was plowed one or two inches deepet than 

 when the manure was plowed in last year for corn, 

 so as to bring the manure within immediate reach 

 of the roots of the oats and young grass, and yet 

 a litsle below the surface, to keep it from drying. 

 Probably two tons of hay per acre will be cut 

 next year on the land that produced oats this 

 year. 



It appears to me that the improvements effect- 

 ed on 'Mr. Bradley's old worn-out plain, are a sat- 

 isfactory demonstration of the advantages of deep 

 plowing, accompanied with high manuring, where- 

 ever there is a good subsoil to operate on. As I 

 have remarked in former communications to the 

 Farmer, many of the fields in the older settled 

 districts of New England have a compact, fine- 

 grained and fertile subsoil, but wholly or mostly 

 unavailable to the crop,s, because, by a coui'se of 



