1861. 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



231 



Again, in watching the potato articles from 

 your various correspondents, it is positive evi- 

 dence to me, and common sense in the aggregate, 

 that it is a fatal mistake to plant small potatoes. 

 On this Island, with a ready market and high 

 price, they avoid seed ends and small potatoes, and 

 select the largest for seed, as every judicious far- 

 mer would select and trace up his best ears of corn 

 for seed. I hope to hear from some of your sub- 

 scribers on this subject at the gathering of the 

 next crop- 

 In corn planting, does not the new dropper 

 place it too closely together ? My impression is, 

 that if the kernels are three or four inches apart, 

 the stock grows freer, ears better, and is less liable 

 to suckers. Has this experiment ever been tried ? 

 Would not heavy winds pass through and allow 

 it to stand up better than if in a solid body ? 

 Weeds and suckers could be more easily extermi- 

 nated. 



In selecting lands for spring wheat, none should 

 be appropriated to this crop but the warmest and 

 earliest on the farm. It should be the first grain 

 in the ground — the seed prepared in salt pickle 

 for 12 hours, raked in ashes. No time must be 

 lost in forcing it, to escape the blight and mildew 

 of dog days. 



Your richest sloping lands are best for winter 

 wheat, sward is best, and every farmer has more 

 or less mowing patches that need the plow. With 

 the advantage of both crops, (spring and winter,) 

 no farmer, making pretensions as such, should go 

 into the market for a barrel of flour. 



Brooklyn, L. I., March 18, 1861. H. Poor. 



For the New England Farmer. 



THOROUGH UNDERDRAININO- "WITH 

 TILE. 



My experience in laying tile drains commenced 

 in August, 1858 ; soil nearly level, formerly ce- 

 dar, pine and black ash swamp ; top soil black 

 muck, from six inches to four feet in depth ; 

 subsoil various. In some places sand, others 

 clay, a mixture of sand and clay, and in some 

 places a real hard pan. Through this swamp runs 

 a small brook which is the outlet of all the tile 

 drains, and in consequence of the slight fall for 

 80 rods below, and a lime-stone rock laying 

 across the bed of the stream, I was unable to set- 

 tle the stream and outlet as low as was desirable, 

 and many of the tiles, at their discharge into the 

 outlet, had to be below the bed of the brook, in 

 order to lay them three feet deep in the soil. 

 This is as shallow a depth as any of 32,000 that 

 are laid up to this time have been placed. This 

 land is so level that the average fall to the drains 

 is rather less than ^ inch to the rod, say about 

 one inch in ten rods ; the distance of drains 

 apart is generally 40 to 42 feet ; those in sandy 

 subsoil, 70 feet ; others in the lowest places, with 

 clay or hard pan subsoil, 30 feet apart. The 

 main drains that enter the outlet, are one of 4^ 

 inch, of 1000 pieces horse shoe tile, laid on a 

 narrow board. This satisfied me with horse-shoe 

 tile ; I want no more of them ; they warp out of 

 shape in burning and make joints too open. Oth- 

 er main drains are 3-inch tile, single or two 

 abreast, or 4-inch each, according to the distance 

 from the outlet, the number of small 2-inch drains 



they receive, and the quantity of water to be dis- 

 charged. 



All of the tile, except the 1000 pieces named, 

 are sole tile, which are the thing. The ditches 

 have all been dug and filled in by hand, tools 

 used, common spades, ground sharp, long and 

 short handled common shovels, picks, iron bars, 

 and sledge. We find stone where the upper 

 ends of the drains enter the uplands to cut off all 

 springs that would enter the swamp land. The 

 bottom of the ditches for the tile should be very 

 true and smooth, M'ithout sags where the water 

 would stand, and the joints of the tile to fit close 

 by using a hammer or trowel if necessary. It is 

 best, generally, to begin at the upper end of the 

 ditches to lay, and lay the branches first, certain- 

 ly, if as convenient, and there is water in the 

 ditches. Pieces of refuse slate are nice where 

 the branches enter main drains, to patch up bad 

 joints, or, when you have to make curves in lay- 

 ing. When digging the ditches we threw the 

 turf on one side, and all the other dirt on the 

 other. All I have drained has been in turf. Be- 

 fore laying, have the ti!e in a line on top of the 

 dirt, then one hand, with a corn-cutter, thin the 

 turf to li or Ih inches in thickness ; another hand 

 stands in the ditch, lays the tile, and packs the 

 turf grass side down on the tile, breaking joints, 

 and as tight as possible ; use up all the turf. The 

 man laying walks backward in the ditch. I throw 

 in about three inches of dirt, carefully, and tread 

 it down snug ; the rest of the dirt is thrown in 

 promiscuously and left to settle. In laying with 

 sods and treading down the dirt at the bottom, 

 the object is to keep the dirt from going to the 

 tile with the water and filling them up ; the wa- 

 ter will readily leak through the soil into the tile, 

 although the soil be tightly packed. 



Some pieces of tile laid the first season, not 

 thus tightly packed, filled up and were dug up 

 and relayed. Fine sand in a loose state, or a 

 hard pan dissolved, composed mostly of fine sand 

 becomes quick sand, and is more apt to fill up 

 tile than any other soil. Clay or loam soil, when 

 there was much fall to the tile, might never do it, 

 although the joints were somewhat open. In lay- 

 ing the tile where we were unable to get a hard 

 bottom by wetness or looseness of the ground, 

 we lay on a board. 



Besidt on the soil by drainage. Some 8^ acres 

 of this soil had been plowed in extreme dry times 

 and seeded for mowing, depending upon open 

 ditches for drainage. Those in two years would 

 nearly fill up. The grass would die out by the 

 excessive wetness and coldness, and be succeed- 

 ed by wild grasses of poor quality and small 

 quantity, and in a wet season there was danger 

 of miring oxen in carting, and until it had been 

 drained the crops never paid the expenses laid 

 out. Last spring two acres plowed the previous 

 fall were sowed early to grass seed, and yielded 

 good three tons of handsome clover and herds- 

 grass hay. Four acres were plowed last spring 

 and planted with potatoes, hoed once, a large 

 yield, the best I have had in fifteen years on any 

 soil. Two acres were sowed with oats and yield- 

 ed largely. One-half acre to ruta bagas and cab- 

 bages and turnips, as satisfactory a crop as one 

 could ask for; the turnips at the rate of 1200 

 bushels to the acre. The remainder of the land 

 drained is not yet finished. The stumpy portion 



