30 MAINK AGRICUIvTURAL EXPERIMENT STATION. I9II. 



tween the rows. A few farmers make a practice of going over 

 the field with a weeder and somewhat flattening the ridge but 

 the number that do this is comparatively few. The method 

 most usually followed is to go between the rows with the cul- 

 tivator perhaps 8 to lo days after the potatoes are planted and 

 then as soon as they begin to break the ground go over with 

 the horse-hoe and bury them up also burying the weeds at the 

 same time and thereby raising the height of the ridge. This 

 kind of cultivation is continued until the tops are too large to 

 pass through without injury. By this time an A shaped ridge 

 has been formed about 12 to 15 inches high and, of course, the 

 surface between the rows has been dropped by the continual 

 scraping up of the soil so that the tubers growing in the ridge 

 are considerably above the surface between the rows. 



It can readily be seen that in a dry season a field so handled 

 must suffer considerably from lack of moisture. Of course, in 

 a wet season as is frequently experienced in Aroostook County 

 no lack of moisture is felt and the drains between the rows are 

 an advantage rather than an injury, but in an extremely dry sea- 

 son it would seem that the drainage is too great. The ridges 

 being high and narrow dry out very quickly and it would ap- 

 pear therefore the crop must suffer more from lack of moisture 

 than it would if the roots of the plants were below the level as 

 they are when modified level culture is practiced. 



The two dry seasons of 1905 and 1906 were somewhat disas- 

 trous to potato fields cultivated, with the high ridge and tlie 

 crop was considerably below a normal crop in the dry sections 

 of the county. For this reason experiments were undertaken 

 in 1907 for the purpose of comparing a more nearly level cul- 

 ture such as is practiced in southern New England and some 

 dryer sections of the country with the ridge method common 

 in Aroostook County. 



Mr. Oscar D. Benn, who lives a short distance out of Houl- 

 ton, has practiced a modification of a ridge and level culture 

 for several years and reports it as successful. He plants the 

 seed as deep as possible with a Robbins planter and keeps the 

 field free from weeds by frequently going over it with the Aveed- 

 er, in three different directions — crosswise, lengthwise and diag- 

 onally. In this way he claims to keep the weeds down during 

 the first stages of growth without injury to the plants more 



