172 
SOUTHEBN CULTIVATOR. 
sible. The spot has either been previously “cowpenned/’ 
or highly manured with cotton seed, or stable compost. 
It must be rich in order to furnish vines sufficient to 
plant the crop. The land is then laid off in rows four and 
a half feet apart, and large beds are thrown up. Drills 
are then opened on the top of the beds, four to five inches 
deep, in which the seed is put, from four to six inches dis- 
tance and covered over with earth and pressed down^ 
Potatoes require careful cultivation. The beds should not 
be allowed to diminish in size, by the rains, and should 
rather be increased in size, as long as they can be hauled 
up with the hoe, without injury to the vines. The earth 
should be stirred very shallow, lest the roots which form 
the potato be injured or cut off; and no grass should be 
allowed to grow on the beds especially,- nor in the alleys. 
If grass is allowed to take root in the beds it will destroy 
the yield ; in removing it even with the greatest care. No 
grass should be allowed to grow in your potato field if 
you wish a crop. But this planting is only a prelimin- 
ary step towards making a crop. The object being prin- 
cipally to raise vines sufficient to plant slips for the crop. 
The plan of lolanting the seed on a level square to get sets 
or draws has been tried effectually by myself at least. It 
is not as productive nor less laborious than the plan I shall 
describe as universally pursued by our planters. 
Two acres of land, rich, well prepared and carefully 
worked, will produce vines sufficient by the middle of 
June to plant 12 to 15 acres of slips ; and slips planted on 
good soil will yield 200 to 300 bushels per acre, on an 
average. The seed potato may or may not be produc- 
tive of roots. This is a minor consideration; the prime 
object being to raise vines sufficient to plant your crop of 
potatoes. If the land, planted in seed potatoes, is rich, 
and the stand is good and the field kept clean, by the 
middle of May to the middle of June there will be vines 
sufficient to plant the crop of potatoes. I have knovm 
good potatoes made from vines planted as late as the lOth 
July, with a late frost. At any rate, if the seasons have 
not been favorable for planting early, it would be well to 
plant as late as July, for if large potatoes are not made, 
what are made will do well for stock and for seed the en- 
suing season. 
Our mode of planting slips to make a potato crop is, 
after the vines are sufficiently grown and abundant, to bed 
up the land selected for planting in large rows four and a 
half feet apart; the top is either leveled or trenched and 
on this is laid three or four vines together, the entire 
length of the beds. Earth is then taken from the alleys 
with hoes, and put on the vines three or four inches thick, 
and packed down tightly, leaving three to five inches of 
the vines exposed, between each clod of earth packed on 
them. If the earth is moist or the weather wet, the vines 
will begin to grow off in .a few days. We generally select 
a “wet spell” for planting slips, to insure their growth 
This is the whole method of planting, and, in my opinion, 
is the best. The potato or “slip field,” as we call it, 
should be kept clear of grass and the beds kept up to their 
original size, and if the soil is good the crop will be good 
also. If the land is thin and requires manuring it can be 
done effectually by scattering well rotted compost or dead 
cotton seed broadcast over the beds. No manure put on 
the potatoes in this manner will be lost. Every pound of 
manure put on the vines in this manner will make a rich 
return in fine potatoes. 
This brings me to the consideration of the question of 
the best manner of manuring potatoes, and I venture the 
opinion, founded on my own experience and observation, 
that the best method is to scatter the manure thickly on 
the top and sides of the beds after the vines or slips are 
planted, and to work it into the surface soil when culti- 
Tating the field. I have richly manured my rows, and 
jhrown up a bed on them and planted, and made very few 
potatoes. On the other hand, I have bedded up rough 
stubble land that did not produce oats two feet high ; 
spread the same quantity of manure on tiie beds, and 
gathered a large crop of fine potatoes. And this is but a 
natural result, when we consider the fact that the Sweet 
Potato is one of those suceulent plants which, like the pea, 
imbibes much of its nourishment and vigor from the at- 
mosphere. I am convined, from experiments made, that 
the tubers grow more from the support of the vines than 
from the manure which may be put in the bed or hill in 
which they grow. 
Let any of your farming friends try the experiment this 
season and they will be satisfied. I believe, with this 
plan, when seed potatoes are as scarce as this season, 
planting from the draws or sets is the most economical, 
but if the vines can be raised so as to enable you to plant 
in the manner here indicated, by the middle of June, a 
greater quantity of potatoes, and of the bes-t kind, can be 
made than any other way. Yours, &c., 
Rup.rcoLA. 
Libya ^ Ga., April, 185G. 
SWEET POTATOES, OHCE MORE, 
Editors Southern Cultivator — Though but recently 
a regular subscriber, I have been a constant reader of 
your journal for many years past with evident satisfaction, 
although most of your matter is more suited to the up- 
country than the sea island regions. My largest interest 
is in tilling the soil, and, therefore, I feel great interest in 
reading every thing you publish. Seeing many articles 
from your correspondents about cultivating the Sweet 
Potato, (and as we on the seaboard do raise potatoes if 
nothing else) I, some time in February, scribbled off the 
enclosed pages on our mode of cultivating or planting. 
The pressure of business of other sorts prevented me from 
completing it. Indeed I was rather ashamed to send such 
a scrawl, and laid it by. 
Having a few leisure moments this evening, I looked 
over it and amended it so as to make it more legible, at 
least, and I now send it to you for your approval or con- 
demnation. As my intentions are good, don't be angry 
if you cannot approve it, but throw it quickly into the re- 
ceptacle of “condemned articles” and let it sleep, I am 
afraid its length will kill it, any how. 
It is astonishing v/hat little progress the seaboard is 
making in agricultural improvements, while the up-coun- 
try is alive and progressing so rapidly ! With the best 
pasturage in the world, we raise neither hogs, sheep nor 
cattle for market. Our planters('l) purchase their horses, 
mules, bacon, lard, butter and cheese from abroad ; in- 
deed, many spend all the money they make by raising 
cotton to purchase corn. 
Think of a planter planting 4 or 5 acres to the hand for 
a crop, using no plows, giving his negroes a peck of corn 
per week and no meat and half a day’s labor to perform 1 
Is it not old fogyism % Yet such is our plantation economy 
on the seaboard ! But enough. 
Respectfully yours, &c., 
T. H. H, 
Savannah, April, 1856, 
[Will not our correspondent make additional efforts to 
arouse our seaboard friends from their apathy 1 Our 
columns shall be ever at his service. — Eds.] 
1^" Gentility is neither in birth, wealth, manner, nor 
fashion — but in the mind. A high sense of honor, a de- 
termination never to take a mean advantage of another, 
an adherence to truth, delicacy and politeness towards 
those with whom we have dealings, are its essential 
characteristics. 
