PLANTING 39 
good results at this first cultivating with common fenders, better re- 
sults will be realized if a box about three feet long is allowed to drag 
between the cultivator shovels for keeping the clods off the corn plants. 
We use 4 V-shaped box, which allows the fine, moist dirt to roll in 
behind it and down against the corn, covering the weeds and nourish- 
ing the plant as only such mellow soil can. 
‘One more cultivation ought to level the furrows and rid the 
rows of all weeds, leaving the third plowing to hill the corn up slightly. 
Avoid cultivating too close to the stalks, rather allowing the shovels to 
run a short distance away and throw the soil against the corn. Where 
one leaves the ridges too sharp at laying-by, it promotes root growth 
too far up on the stalks; this ridge washes away a little later, and 
the tender lower portions of the stalk thus exposed to the heat of the 
sun, usually so extreme at this season, are literally scorched. This is 
sure to cut down the yield of the corn. We give the corn a gently 
sloping hilling-up at laying by, and continue to promote the dust mulch 
by working between the rows with the five-shovel cultivator, sometimes 
practicing this even after the corn is in tassel. 
‘As here shown, it requires considerably less labor to produce corn 
where the land is listed than if planted by the corn planter, since it 
can be put in the ground quicker and easier, cultivated with less work 
and greater ease, and will actually yield more, one year with another. 
Other advantages that add materially to the excellence of listing are: 
The roots of the corn are so deeply set in the soil that they brace 
and hold the stalks in an upright position, thus avoiding the damage 
so often resulting from planted corn being blown down by the wind;, 
also making a field of listed corn more agreeable to husk in. Then, 
this same deep-root system leaves less of the stalk above the soil, and 
so lowers the relative height of the ear from the ground, thus leaving 
it where it can be easily and quickly reached at husking time. This 
advantage can be appreciated only after husking the high, unhandy 
ears in a field that was planted by planter. 
“MM. A. COVERDELL.’’ 
Distance APART OF PLANTING 
The distance between the rows of corn varies from as 
close as three feet, in the North, to as far apart as six feet 
in the South. The closeness of the rows in the North is due: 
first, to the fact that the earlier varieties planted do not grow 
more than half as tall as do the later maturing varieties grown 
in the South; secondly, to the fact that it is more difficult 
to obtain a stand in the extreme northern edge of the Corn 
Belt, which makes it necessary to plant closer in order to 
