148 



J0TJBNA1 OF HORTICU1TUEE AND COTTAGKB GARDENEE. 



[ February 24, 1863. 



answered well, and permitted of changing and renewing as you 

 suggest. In fact, no doubt the plan would be more general 

 but for the expense, gardeners finding enough of trouble to get 

 a border done, let alone dividing it with walls.] 



PLANTING POTATOES ON THE EIDGE 



SYSTEM. 



One correspondent, "D.," says, "I intend to plant sixty 

 acres of Potatoes on the ridge system, as I am certain it will 

 prove the right plan. The question is, How ? Your garden method 

 is, of course, out of the question. We find manure a necessary 

 adjunct for a good crop, and the width of the ridges must 

 necessarily be determined by the width between cart wheels, which 

 in most cases is 5 feet ; henoe 2£ feet must be the width of each 

 ridge. This I contend is not a fair trial, as there is not a sufficient 

 width of earth on the top to secure room for a large quantity of 

 good tubers. Supposing, however, that it is so, or is made so by 

 deep cultivation between the ridges, and moulding-up twice, then 

 how would you plant the sets ? On the manure would not be 

 safe. Besides, it would be too deep if ridged-up with the plough 

 (8 to 12 inches). Would dibbling by hand on the top of the 

 ridge, after the plough, do ? Again, supposing 5 cwt. of guano 

 per acre were sown broadcast and the ridges closed-up at once 

 from the winter " till," the guano would be all there, and the 

 ridges might be made any width. How would the dibble do 

 then ? Is 3 feet too wide for field cultivation ? " 



It is, according to my judgment radically wrong to apply raw 

 manure in the drills when planting the Potato. It must be bad 

 practice to place a pulpy tuber in a mass of sweltering cor- 

 ruption ! The microscope shows the Potato to be one of the 

 most delicately-constructed vegetables in creation, and even 

 should the sets escape the festering evil, when in a poor soil 

 dung is used after this manner under the idea of making the 

 most of it, the young plants may grow away very freely at first ; 

 but as the roots lengthen, they do so into a barren soil — an 

 abundant machinery with a scarcity of raw material— juBt 

 when the formation of young tubers and the advancing state of 

 the growth of the plants require an extra supply of nourish- 

 ment. The start they had at first secured a vigorous foliage, to 

 become stunted, starved, and unfruitful for lack of nourishment. 

 But "D." finds "manure necessary," whereby I presume his 

 land is light. I would, therefore, advise eighteen or twenty 

 loads per acre to be spread and ploughed and well worked into 

 the body of the land immediately, for properly the dung should 

 have been administered last November ; and if 3 cwt. or so of 

 superphosphate of lime were sown broadcast just before the 

 land is ridged-up, it would do no harm. If the land is well 

 drained and has been pulverised with the subsoil plough to the 

 depth of 18 inches or 2 feet, and so made permeable to the 

 warmth and moisture of the atmosphere, I should consider that 

 to be far before the most bountiful application of raw dung for 

 the Potato now, if it were coupled with a top-dressing of lime 

 or guano at planting time. 



lime is especially favourable to the growth of the Potato, 

 and in some form or other is generally present in plants, light 

 lands require it in a less proportion than heavy soils, though even 

 light soils are rendered more compact in consequence of the lime 

 attracting moisture powerfully from the air. It cannot prove 

 but beneficial to a clay, for it not only destroys the myriads of 

 insect life to which moisture is congenial, but speedily converts 

 to vegetable mould the stubborn fragments of previous crops, 

 besides acting on the inorganic ingredients brought forward by 

 the subsoiler and rendering soluble the salts of the earth along 

 with the acids, and adapting them for the nutriment of vegetable 

 life. Talk of the "earth being in its dotage" on account of the 

 " exhaustion of vegetable mould," is nonsense, so long as there 

 remains a subsoil to be brought up every few years to the 

 action of a winter's frost and then a dressing of quicklime to 

 tackle it. On a stiff clay I would use from seventy to eighty 

 bushels of quicklime, procured fresh from the kiln, and spread 

 it, not over-slacked, on the surface of the land just before 

 ridging-up. If a light soil and guano should be decided upon, I 

 would sow it broadcast just before ridging at the rate of from 

 10 to 15 cwt. per acre. 



The manner in which I have said I would apply the dung, 

 &c., does away with the necessity of trundling cart wheels be- 

 tween the ridges, and of the plough to split the ridges again 

 for the purpose of covering over the dung. I should not like to 



trust to a thirty-inch-wide ridge on good ground — 3 feet in that 

 case for the field culture of medium-topping sorts of Potatoes, 

 would do very well. For the very large-tubered and branching 

 sorts I should prefer a forty-two-inch base for my ridge to rest 

 upon, and for it to be formed 1 foot broad at its apex, which 

 could be eventually achieved by passing a light roller over the 

 tops of the ridges. Iu Shropshire, where they manage these things 

 better — at least, in so far as regards the cultivation of the Swede 

 Turnip — I think, than in any other county, barring, perhaps, 

 some parts of the county of Angus and thereaway, they would 

 put a horse to a double mould-board plough and finish off tidily 

 between the ridges almost as fast as a man could walk. 



Unless " D." is satisfied with his ploughman's accomplishments 

 in this matter, and on so large a scale, if I were he I really 

 should feel greatly inclined to advertise in the Hereford Journal 

 for a man, who is an adept in ridging with the plough, to 

 come from the neighbourhood of ludlow, or the radius from 

 thence to Shrewsbury, for the occasion. I have enjoyed the 

 sight of whole fields in ridges about there struck out to the 

 nicest admeasurement, and as straight as ramrods. 



Yes, the dibble would be the instrument for the field ; the 

 sets should be placed 7 or 8 inches deep, and I would set my 

 face entirely against after-moulding. By hoe and by hand I 

 would keep down the weeds and pick off the blossoms, for from 

 them we may anticipate seed, the formation of which compels 

 nature's exertion to the uttermost, and, of course, at the expense 

 of the tubers, of which in due time, and the Fates being pro- 

 pitious, I would guarantee a crop on our ridge system to far 

 surpass that on the old pottering, moulding-up plan so long the 

 vogue. 



The way I have dovetailed a compromise between the garden 

 and the field for " D.'s" consideration is one which I hope may 

 suit his views. What I have written I have not written without 

 regard to diffidence. I should be sorry to mislead by advising 

 a system which I have not proved by trial ; still I have confidence 

 sufficient in my recommendation to say, had I the opportunity 

 I would work it out. Another correspondent, " C. S.," who 

 inquires " whether Potatoes can be planted efficiently with the 

 plough on the ridge system ?" is answered by the above. To 

 "D." of Newcastle, I answer, what I mean by the "flat" is the 

 old system of burying the sets in the ground and moulding them 

 up afterwards as they grow, in contradistinction to laying the 

 sets on the surface of the soil, and then casting over them with 

 a spade the mould from the centre between the rows, which thus 

 constitute the ridge and trench system, and the Potatoes do not 

 require to be moulded afterwards. — TTewabds and Onwabds. 



TEMPOEAEY DECOEATIONS OF EOOMS FOE 

 FESTIVE OCCASIONS. 



A COBEE3PONUEHT has very properly called the attention of 

 the Editors of The JotrBNAi, as Hobticultube to the im- 

 portant subject of decorating public halls and other places of 

 resort on special occasions, like the auspicious one to which the 

 British public are looking forward with so much interest at the 

 present time — the marriage of the Prince of Wales. 



Although the art of applying material so as to produce a 

 pleasing and beautiful effect, has been studied by a class who 

 nave dignified their calling by the high-sounding term of 

 Decorators, there are many who are obliged to undertake the 

 practice of the art themselves in times like that which is now 

 approaching : therefore, a few hints may be useful to them. 



When we see the manner in which some of our churches are 

 decorated at Christmas as compared with what they were twenty 

 years ago, it is apparent that one of the most important items 

 for temporary decoration, evergreens, has not hitherto entered 

 so freely into the general display of public rooms as they might 

 be made to do. It is, therefore, chiefly with a view to urge 

 their claims to notice, that I am induced to repeat much of the 

 substance of an article I formerly contributed, adding such 

 other matter as may seem necessary to make the subject fully 

 understood. At the same time I hope, after the event now ap- 

 proaching is over, some readers of this Journal will report the 

 features of any particular place that was tastefully and yet 

 economically decorated, for when a good display has to be made 

 at a trifling or reasonable cost, the items that compose it must 

 be cheap and plentiful. Mechanical men generally look on 

 manufactured goods as the most proper for every purpose, useful 

 or ornamental ; hence the decorative features of public rooms 



