54 
CULTURE OF RICE. 
tides, with the East wind, in spring and autumn, 
banks or dykes are constructed along the borders of 
the rivers, at from ten to thirty yards from the water’s 
edge ; the distance depending upon local circum¬ 
stances. These dykes should be raised four feet 
above the general level of the land, and it will re¬ 
quire to do this, a ditch or trench to be dug at twenty 
feet from the bank within the field, ten feet wide, 
and four feet deep, in marsh lands where there are 
no trees to obstruct the labor. Ten feet in length of 
this dyke and trench is accomplished per diem by the 
laborer; but when the land is covered with wood, 
not more than half the quantity can be calculated 
upon. When the great outline of the field has been 
accomplished, and water-gates (called trunks or flood¬ 
gates) have been put down, so low as to draw the 
water from the fields and trenches when the tide sub¬ 
sides in the river, and to flow them when it may be 
necessary to the crop, and when the tide is at its full; 
then subdivisions are made within these outer dykes 
by other dykes, so as to lay the field off into conve¬ 
nient portions of from twenty to fifty acres, in such 
forms as are best adapted for taking on and letting 
off the waters from the fields. For myself I believed 
and experienced great benefit in receiving the waters 
of the river at one end of the field, allowing them to 
escape or weep off by a small water-gate at the op¬ 
posite end, as this necessarily changes every portion 
of the water; again, small drains eighteen inches at 
top, and nine inches at bottom, and two feet deep, 
should be carried across these fields in their shortest 
diameter, at every hundred feet distance, or better 
still, at every fifty feet distance; so that when the 
waters are withdrawn, there is no sobbing or partial 
pondage, from inequality of level. 
These objects being accomplished, and the soil 
prepared for the operation of sowing the seed, 
trenches are made with a hoe in new lands, and 
sometimes with a plow in old at fourteen inches 
apart, so as generally to give eighty-four of these 
trenches in a quarter of an acre; from two to two 
and a half bushels of rice are sown carefully along 
the drills to the acre to be covered with two inches 
of soil. When this operation is accomplished in one 
of the divisions of the field, the water-gates are open¬ 
ed, and the water let in, and kept on the field from 
five to ten days, depending upon the temperature of 
the weather to sprout the rice in the first place ; and 
again, to take off’ all redundant matter that may float 
upon the surface of the water, and which will be 
drifted to one or other side of the field, as the winds 
may blow. When these five or ten days have passed 
away, and the rice, on examination, is found to be 
germinating at its bud, and the trash or drift floating 
upon the surface of the water is removed, the waters 
are withdrawn from the field. From four to ten days 
will show the rice, rising green along the drills; but 
the birds will be collecting in flocks from every quar¬ 
ter, to prey upon the rice, just showing itself on the 
surface, the grain softened, yet sound and sweet. 
From this cause, for myself (although many do not 
do this), I let the water again upon the field, and 
keep it there from two to four days, according to the 
temperature of the weather—if warm, shorter; if cold, 
longer; this pushes the rice forward, and shortens 
the time that the birds can operate injuriously upon 
it, and is called by rice men the point flow. Let it be I 
understood, however, that it is almost impossible to ! 
save rice that vegetates and comes through the ground 
during the month of May, from a small bird of pas¬ 
sage, called commonly the May bird (described by 
Bertram and other naturalists under other names), 
which, arriving from the south, sweeps whole fields 
before it. If, therefore, we are as late as May 
with any portion of our rice crop—which we should 
finish planting, if possible, in March and April—we 
must wait until June, when these birds wing their 
way to the north to seek for wheat and other small 
grain, and to find a softer sun. Again, when the rice 
has risen a few inches, the surface of the soil be¬ 
comes dry about two weeks after withdrawing the 
water from the point flow; the grass is carefully 
picked from the rice drills, the intermediate space is 
lightly hoed, and the field is then left to dry two or 
three days, that life may be extinct in the grass that 
has either been drawn from the drills or hoed in the 
intermediate space. I then again flow the field. 
Many do not, until a second operation or hoeing has 
been gone through; but water costs nothing, and I 
like to use it when I have the power; because it 
gives time to carry on the same operation over the 
other fields. At this second flowing of the fields I 
would keep the water on ten days, taking care not to 
make it too deep, so as to drown the rice in the lower 
parts of the field, or to throw it down on the with- 
drawment of the water, which would be the case if 
the water was deep, or the rice run up too high. 
After the water is a second time withdrawn, the field 
is again carefully hoed, and this time deeper than at 
the first operation. When the fields are again clean, 
the water is for the third time taken upon the rice, to 
keep down the grass, and to give time to go through 
the several divisions in order ; and at this flowing the 
water is kept on from twelve to fifteen days, and 
sometimes even twenty; so that the planter may be 
prepared to operate upon them, as he one by one suc¬ 
cessively withdraws the water. At this point the 
fields are finally, but carefully, picked and hoed, and 
these operations continued until the rice begins to 
joint low down; this is discovered by a horizontal 
stripe across the blade, or by pulling up and examin¬ 
ing some plants of the rice. When these indications 
are discovered, the water is let on, and deepened upon 
the rice as it grows, and is kept as deep as the growth 
of the rice will admit, and is not again withdrawn 
until three or four days before you begin your har¬ 
vest of each field, in succession ; lest the wind orbeat¬ 
ing rain, on the withdrawment of the water, cause the 
rice to fall or lodge, which would diminish its quan¬ 
tity and injure its quality, and greatly add to the labor 
of harvesting. 
During all these waterings, it is important to avail 
ourselves of every successive tide, to take water in 
at the river gate, and to allow it to weep through the 
small gate or trunk at the back of the field. Some¬ 
times, when the water has been long upon your fields, 
a destructive worm makes its appearance at the roots 
of the rice. They can only be destroyed by a with¬ 
drawment of the water for a few days. Sometimes, 
when the fields have been long kept dry, a worm of 
another description, like the caterpillar, takes the 
blade. They can only be destroyed by letting the 
water in upon the field, whatever its condition may 
be, as to grass or otherwise. 
It is this command of water at will that makes the 
' I value of our tide land. In the best lands in Loin* 
