Porarors 1381 
the summer rain penetrates to the roots about each plant. 
Those who plant early will contend that potatoes planted deep 
will be longer coming up, and the crop will not be as good as 
if they were planted more shallow and afterward ridged. This 
is true, yet the principle cbtains. Early in the season the 
ground is cold and has an overabundance of water. If planted 
and covered deep, it will take a long time for the sun to pene- 
trate to the tuber. Hence, they sometimes fail to come up at 
all, or are too late for the highest price. If, instead of cover- 
ing deeply all at once, just enough of the warm surface earth is 
put on to keep them from chilling, the sun will warm and start 
the eyes. After a few days put on, with a harrow, a little more 
earth which has also become warm, and repeat the process until 
the ground is level, when the potatoes will come up quickly 
and be strong. At the same time one has cheaply stirred the 
ground, retaining the moisture, and destroying countless weeds 
just as they were sprouting. 
Except in very foul ground, on which it will seldom pay to 
plant potatoes, the best yields are obtained from drill, rather 
than from check row planting. More hills can be put on an 
acre and there is less disturbance of the roots by late cultiva- 
tion when this is done only one way. 
FERTILIZERS 
How much fertilizer and what kind to use, depends largely 
on the soil. If one has a clover sod, that will help to supply 
nitrogen, and the decaying vegetable matter will emit acids 
which help to liberate mineral plant food. In this case it will 
not be necessary to supply so much commercial fertilizer, particu- 
larly nitrogen. It is important to remember that nitrogen in 
organic matter, such as the decaying sod, manure, tankage, 
fish scrap or the like, will not become available until the ground 
is warm. Hence, for early potatoes, or where one depends in 
part on the sod, I would use nitrogen in the form of nitrate of 
soda. This is available at once, and for every 100 pounds of 
nitrogen applied, 63 pounds are found in the plant, while from 
organic sources, not more than 41 pounds in each 100 pounds 
applied. For this reason I believe it economy, when nitrogen 
