AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
SOW CLOVER FOR MANURE-WHY-WHEN- 
HOW. 
Why. —We suppose a majority of farmers 
are, by this time, aware of the advantages 
of turning under a good crop of clover, as a 
means of fertilizing the soil,—we are 
sorry that the seed is so scarce and high 
the present season as to curtail the usual 
practice in any degree. Still, even with the 
seed at 13 to 16 cents per pound, it will pay 
on the great mass of poorer soils, especially 
those devoted to wheat or rye culture. But 
there are many who contend that plowing 
in clover cannot improve the soil, because 
“it is simply putting back into the ground a 
crop grown from itwhile others, who are 
convinced from experience that the practice 
is a good one, are still at a loss to account 
for the results produced. Both of these 
classes may learn something from a consid- 
ation of the method in which plants grow. 
If we take a box of earth, containing, say 
600 pounds, and weigh it carefully, and then 
sow an ounce of clover seed in it, we can 
continue to remove successive crops until 
we have taken off more weight of clover 
than the entire weight of earth in the box at 
first: and this, too, without adding anything 
but the purest water. After we have re¬ 
moved this crop we shall find the box of 
earth to weigh more than 500 pounds, (its 
original weight,) at least, nearly as much 
more as the weight of the roots remaining 
in the contained soil. As we explained in 
an article published several months since, 
the clover grown has been derived from the 
air ; and such is the case with all plants. 
» Their principal food comes from the atmo¬ 
sphere, from which it has been extracted by 
the surface of the leaves. 
But experience teaches that the growth 
of any plant is accelerated, especially in its 
early stages, by supplying the soil with a 
small percentage of organic manure—that 
is, animal or vegetable matter, A single 
handful of animal excrements or decaying 
straw mingled with a square foot of ground 
will often insure its fertility, and cause it to 
produce a large hill of corn, for example, 
when, without this addition, notone-half of 
the yield would have been obtained. 
An application of these facts explains the 
benefit of plowing under clover. A soil may 
be so poor that clover itself will not grow 
When this is the case, a small amount of 
manure from the yard, or a few hundred 
pounds per acre of gypsum (plaster of Paris) 
will generally furnish the needed food or 
stimulus. When we can get the clover ’to 
grow, its great amount of leaf surface will 
radidly abstract the invisible elements float¬ 
ing in or combined with the air, and store 
them in the stalks,leaves, and roots. When 
these are plowed under and mingled with 
the earth it is directly equivalent to bring¬ 
ing from a foreign source an amount of 
manure equal to the clover crop itself. We 
repeat, the clover does not “ come from the 
soil, but is derived from a foreign source, 
and is so much added to the needed organic 
material required to produce wheat, rye, or 
other crops more difficult to be grown than 
clover. We have brought a number of com¬ 
paratively barren fields to a high state of 
fertility with no other application than a lit¬ 
tle plaster at first, and turning under a few 
successive crops of clover when in their 
fullest growth—at the time of flowering. 
We have, in few instances, been obliged 
to use yard manures, and, in the absence of 
these, an application of guano, or finely 
ground unburnt bones, before we could get 
clover to grow well; but when clover would 
grow, we have found no difficulty in bring¬ 
ing a field to a high degree of fertility, if it 
was not so sandy and devoid of fine mate¬ 
rial as to furnish no suitable medium for the 
growth of the small rootlets of plants. 
The large amount of nitrogenous elements 
in clover, as well as the large leaf surface, 
render this one of the best manuring plants ; 
and, with the growing scarcity of good ma¬ 
nures ,farmers should turn their attention 
more to this subject. 
When. —Much diversity of practice pre¬ 
vails. Judging from our own experience, as 
well as observation, we think decidedly the 
best season is during the months of March or 
April, according to the latitute. But clover 
can be sown in May, especially this late sea¬ 
son, even upon Winter crops, though it is 
rather late for this. Upon oats, &c., sow this 
month, of course, as it must be sown after 
these seeds are in the ground. 
How.—Upon Spring crops, the better plan 
is to finish harrowing in the grain seeds, and 
then sow the clover seed, working it in with 
a light harrow, or with a bush. For Winter 
crops, wheat and rye, some sow upon snow 
—and this is not a bad plan, as it easy to see 
whether the seed falls evenly, and when the 
snow melts away it in part washes the earth 
upon the seed. But even this is objectiona¬ 
ble, since some of the seeds will remain un¬ 
covered; and, in the event of a sudden thaw 
or rain, currents of water will be produced 
which will wash the seed into furrows or 
low spots. 
Our most successful practice has been to 
wait until the snow has departed, and choose 
a morning, or mornings, when the ground is 
frozen an inch or so in depth, and when 
there is little air stirring, and then carefully 
sow the seed as evenly as possible. At this 
time the surface of the earth is filled with 
little crevices formed by the frost. Into 
these the seeds fall, and, when the ground 
thaws again, most of them are as thoroughly 
covered as if planted by hand. 
Soaking the seed. —When the sowing is 
done late in the Spring it often happens that 
the surface of the ground is too dry to start 
them. In this case it is well to soak 
the seeds. A writer in the Rural New- 
Yorker, who has practiced soaking his seed 
for a period of twelve hours, in weak brine, 
and then rolling it in plaster of Paris before 
sowing, finds that by comparing the result 
with seed sown dry, in the usual way, in 
parts of the same field, great advantages are 
gained by the practice. He says, the next 
Spring you can see the difference in favor of 
the soaked seed as far as you could see the 
lot, and it continued to produf e more and 
better clover until he ( plowed i up. He has 
followed the practice ever since, and has 
not missed a crop, though the two last sea¬ 
sons were dry. 
In scattering the seed, it is placed, while 
in the bag, into some vessel large enough to 
give room to swell, and an hour or two be¬ 
fore using it is taken out of the water to 
drain, when it is rolled in plaster. The 
soaking and plaster adds to the weight, and 
enables the farmer to sow it much more 
evenly especially if the weather is windy. 
As the present season is backward, and clo¬ 
ver seed is scarce and dear, the plan of soak¬ 
ing the seed is worthy of trial. On most 
soils plaster is the best application that can 
be made, and when applied directly to the 
seed it receives an important stimulus just at 
the period when it is most needed.— Ed. 
THE LATE SEASON—CORN PLANTING. 
If this late spring should be followed by 
early autumn frost, as was the case in 1836, 
much of the corn crop of the United States 
will be seriously injured, unless it should 
ripen one to two weeks earlier than is com¬ 
mon. To insure earlier ripening, it is quite de¬ 
sirable to select the seed from some locality 
two to four degrees north of the place where 
planted. The extra expense of this would 
be trifling—the extra gain might be very 
great. 
The early varieties of corn from Canada 
and the most northern sections of the United 
States, will ripen in eighty-five to ninety 
days from planting. But these are of a 
dwarf growth of stalk , though some of them 
are as great yielders in grain as any other 
variety. Still, we would not recommend 
these for general field culture south of 42 
degrees north latitude, but a taller, stronger 
growing variety,'several of which ripen in 
ninety to one hundred days. In the summer 
of 1837, a neighbor of ours raised a very fine 
crop of corn—stalk and ear of full medium 
size—the grain of which glazed in eighty-five 
days after planting. The yield was fully 
thirty-seven bushels per acre. Indian corn 
is the largest and most important crop 
grown in America. 
It behooves us, therefore, to give it special 
attention. Everything likely to increase the 
amount of yield per acre, to facilitate and 
cheapen cultivation and harvesting, to im¬ 
prove its quality and certainty of ripening 
before an early frost, should be subjects 
of careful study on the part of farmers. 
Their wealth as well as their comfort and 
happiness, may be greatly increased there¬ 
by.—[E d. 
Experiment with Potatoes. —Mr. J. G. 
Johnson, of Providence, writes us that he 
finds a tablespoonful of coarse salts dropped 
on a hill of potatoes, and dug in at the first 
hoeing is a valuable application on his soil, 
which is of a light, sandy character. Please 
give a full description of the experiments 
with the result. What kind of “ salts ” were 
used 1 
Let others experiments with a few hills 
Try salts (epsom and glauber) on some 
common salt on others ; ashes, plaster, lime 
&c., on others.—E d. 
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