Experiments in the Planting of Potatoes. 
865 
of disease in this district (Bedfordshire), so that good crops were 
the i-ule rather than the exception. The rainfall, though spread 
out in many showers during June and July, was below the average, 
ond the weather was exceptionally tine after J uly 20. 
The first planting was done on March 31, two poles of each 
variety being spaded in. After an interval of a month another 
planting took place, a similar quantity of each of the fourteen varie- 
ties being again spaded in. All that was done to the land, in addi- 
tion to what had been done previous to the first planting, was to run 
the horse-hoe up the drill-marks. This was only fair, as otherwise 
the land would have become somewhat set, and the potatoes would 
not have gone in so well at the later as at the earlier plantings ; for 
this reason the horse-hoe was also used before each of the other 
plantings. After another month — namely, on May 31 — another 
planting was made of all the vai'ieties, but this time and subse- 
quently only one pole of each lot was planted. A fortnight later 
twelve of the fourteen varieties were planted ; and .still another 
fortnight later — namely, on June 28 — the last planting was done, 
and ten out of the fourteen varieties were set. It will be shown 
subsequently that the plantings were carried late enough for the 
purposes of the experiment. The potatoes were horse-hoed, hand- 
hoed, and moulded up in the usual manner, as soon as the crop wa 
sufficiently forwai-d. 
The accompanying table shows in a more concise form th 
varieties selected, and some other particulars, including the fina 
results. 
It will be seen that, in accordance with the usual farm practice, 
the earlies were planted at 24 in. from row to row by 18 in. from 
set to set, that being about the usual distance when they are not 
required for digging green ; whilst the mid-earlies and main croppers 
were given a larger space in which to develop — namely, 24 in. between 
the rows and 21 in. between the sets. The potatoes were regarded 
as ripened when the stems had entirely died down and no sap 
remained. As it is practically impossible to fix this to a day or two 
on some scores of sets, the date put down was that of the next 
Saturday after the first day when no life could be perceived in any 
of the stems on the plot. It will be noticed that though the plant- 
ings occupied a period from first to last of 12 weeks 5 days, the 
greatest difierence between the time of ripening of the first planting 
and that of the last planting of any one variety was only six weeks, 
and this occurred in the first earlies alone. Of the mid-earlies only one 
plot (White Elephant) made a difierence of as much as five weeks, 
and the longest interval on the main varieties was but four weeks, 
and that on one variety (The Bruce) alone. 
It seems only reasonable to expect the best results from those 
plantings that had the longest time to develop in the ground, and 
this is almost invariably the case ; for we find that, of the 14 
plantings made on March 31, 13 yielded more than those planted 
a month later, whilst the fourteenth (Myatt's Ashleaf) produced 
an equal bulk. Of the same number planted on April 30, 13 
