202 POTATOES. 



horse loads of barn-yard manure or compost to each 

 acre. When fish guano is used, it is mixed with soil 

 for a week or two before planting-time, and then 

 spread over the surface at the rate of from three- 

 quarters to a ton to the acre. When barn-yard man- 

 ure is used, the ground is harrowed before spreading 

 the manure and with special fertilizers, such as phos- 

 phate, bone-dust, or guano ; the harrowing is done after 

 applying the manure, giving the ground only one 

 " scrape," to level the surface. We change the seed 

 every two years. For seed, I prefer large-sized Po- 

 tatoes, cut into two, three, a;nd four pieces, a fort- 

 night at least before planting, and then dusted with 

 wood-ashes. This I have done in wet or inclement 

 weather during the month of March, when the men 

 cannot work to advantage out of doors. With every- 

 thing in readiness for planting, the seed Potatoes are 

 put into barrels, carted to the field and placed at 

 convenient distances across the lot, so that the per- 

 sons "dropping" will lose no time and waste no 

 strength in carrying the Potatoes from one end of the 

 field to the other. This may appear trifling, but I 

 find, when this plan is carried out, the work goes on 

 more rapidly, and two persons will drop as much as 

 three, when no system is practised. From the effects 

 of the Fall ploughing, the alternate freezing and thaw- 

 ing during Winter, and with a ploughing in Spring, the 

 ground will turn up kind and mellow, just in the 

 right tilth for planting. The Potatoes are put in at 

 the third ploughing, in the following manner. Com- 

 mencing at one side of the field, twenty oi thirty 

 feet from the fence, the plouglunan with his horses 



