10 
BULLETIN - 511, U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 
The spike-tooth and disk harrows are extensively used on every 
type of soil. In most areas the turning plow is used for bedding the 
land. Quite often the middle buster, or lister, is employed for this 
purpose. This implement is also used to some extent for plowing 
land in parts of Texas and Oklahoma. Fertilizer distributors (fig. 4) 
are used in all areas where fertilizer is applied to cotton. This imple- 
ment is often employed instead of a shovel plow for opening up the 
rows. 
PLANTING. 
The time of planting cotton is governed largely by the type of soil 
and the climatic conditions. Clay soils do not warm up as rapidly in 
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P IMS 
Fig. 5.— Chopping cotton. The seed is sown in drills, and at the first or second cultivation the plants are 
chopped to a stand with a hoe, leaving one stalk every 12 to 15 inches in the drill. 
the spring as light sandy soils; therefore, cotton is planted later on 
the heavy clay soils, other conditions being equal. 
It is customary to plant cotton on a slightly raised bed. There 
are two reasons for this: (1) It is much easier to thin the cotton to a 
stand when it is planted on a bed than when it is planted level, cotton 
being thinned by hand with a hoe and much labor being involved 
(fig. 5). (2) Another reason for planting cotton on a bed is that when 
land is bedded up, more surface is exposed to the air and sunshine, 
and consequently the land warms up more quickly, thereby giving the 
cotton an earlier start. Bedding up also affords better drainage con- 
ditions, which must be considered in many parts of the cotton belt. 
In only a few areas, where dry weather prevails during the growing 
season, is cotton ever listed. 
