Vol XLI. No. 1T08. 
NEW YORK, OCT. 21, 1882. 
PRICE FIVE CEm S .— 
$2,00 PER YEAR 
[Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1882, by the Rural New-Yorker, in the office of the Librarian of Congress at Washington.] 
farm (Topics. 
<£xirerimcnt (Cvauntls of the plural 
ITctv - UorfefV. 
TILE DRAINAGE-NO. 3. 
Why to Drain. 
W. I. CHAMBERLAIN. 
AN EXPERIMENT WITH OATS AND j 
FERTILIZERS. 
kind 
SMALL quantity of 
of oats called Mam¬ 
moth Russian Rust¬ 
proof was sent to us 
several years ago by 
Mr. Samuel Sellew, 
of Chebanse, Ill., 
with the request 
that we would test 
them and report. 
This we have failed 
to do until now. 
We cannot find our account of the 
first year’s results. Last year they 
were sown with Italian Itye Grass at 
the rate of one bushel and 12 quarts per 
acre. The yield was at the rate of 
about 40 bushelB to the acre. We 
do not in this case pretend to give 
exact figures. The oats were plainly 
crowded by the Rye Grass. They 
grew less than three feet high, bear¬ 
ing quite large panicles of very large 
oats which were entirely free from 
rust. They weighed 27 pounds to 
the bushel. Some of this seed was 
sown the present season on plots 
variously manured (see Rural of 
June 3) and the results are surprising. 
It is often suggested we should 
write of our failures as well as of our 
successes. In this experiment it will 
be seen that we do so. 
An old, worthless sod of weeds 
and brambles was turned under in 
March, harrowed and raked’so as to 
rid it of large stones and all plants 
not fully covered by plowing. Upon 
plots 1. 2, and 8, Baugh’s $35 phos 
phate was sown at the rate of 800, 
400, and 200 pounds to the acre re¬ 
spectively. The yield was respec¬ 
tively at the rate of 6, 7, and 5 bush¬ 
els to the acre. 
On plot 4 no fertilizer was sown. 
On plots 5, 0, and 7 Mapes’s $50 ferti¬ 
lizer was sown the same as on plots 1, 
2, and 8, viz.: at the rate of 800, 400, 
and 200 pounds to the acre. The 
yield of plot No 4, which received 
no fertilizer, was three bushels to the 
acre. The yields of plots 4, 5. and 6 
were respectively 15, Sand 0 bushels. 
The plots received some farm ma¬ 
nure in the hill for corn, in 1871. 
With this exception the field has re¬ 
ceived no manure of any kind in 
Bixteen years for certain. We 
thought the selection was a good 
one to test the effect of concentrated 
fertilizers on oats. 
The Baugh’s fertilizer contained of 
ammonia 2 to 21* per cent; phospho¬ 
ric acid, 5 to 6 per cent; no potash. 
Mapes’s contained—Ammonia, 0 to 
8 per cent ; phosphoric acid, 7 to 9 
per cent; potash, 6 to 8 per cent. 
We leave our leaders to account 
for this failure as best they may. We have 
no plausible theory to advance. 
The oats, of which we give an accurate il¬ 
lustration (Fig. 388) of the average panicle, 
will be seen to be of large size, though the pan¬ 
icle itself bears comparatively few spikelets. 
The season was most favorable to oats, wheat 
nd rye, though unfavorable to corn, viz., 
wet Spring and a droughty Summer. 
The preceding article gave it as the main 
purpose of tile drainage to relieve the soil of 
surplus moisture, and showed that surplus 
moisture often actually drowns vegetation 
while it is always a damage, and that its re¬ 
moval accelerates cultivation and growth in 
depth of the soil. Roots, except those of 
water plants, will not go beneath the level of 
constant saturation. Even deep-rooted vege¬ 
tables, like parsnips, on swamp land surface- 
drained, may grow large at the top but when 
they reach the level of constant saturation they 
spread into numerous small roots w hich keep 
near the surface. Of course, therefore, drain¬ 
age by removing this stagnant water of satura¬ 
tion and permitting the roots to run deeper, 
increases the pasture ground of the roots, and 
MAMMOTH RUSSIAN RUST-PROOF OATS. [From Nature.]—Fig. 388. 
several ways and for several philosophic and 
very evideut reasons there given; also that 
the removal of surplus moisture in Spring¬ 
time and after every heavy rain really leaves 
more available moisture in time of drouth. 
The reasons for this apparent paradox were 
given in part in that article. Additional 
reasons are that; 
4th. Tile drainage increases the available 
admits them to deeper sources of moisture in 
drouth. I know from extensive observation 
on my own l.md that in a stiff, clay soil, 
drained three feet deep, wheat roots will go 
as deep as the drains through every foot of 
the subsoil, and that wheat will suffer scarcely 
at all when the surface fora foot deep or more 
is suffering severely from drouth. 
5th. Tile draiuage prevents surface tvash, 
sometimes not entirely on steep slopes during 
heavy rains, but it does so in the main on 
fairly level land rightly managed. Surface 
wash, except on turf, carries much of the soil 
bodily, and robs what remains of much of its 
most valuable elements of fertility, especially 
when recently manured. But if the land is 
tile-drained at proper intervals, the rains soak 
deep into the porous soil, carrying the warmth 
of the atmosphere and the soluble elements 
of plant-food deep down to the very roots of 
the plants where they are needed. 
And if any of the water finally 
reaches the drains, it has been filtered 
through three feet or more of soil and 
is pure and clean and free from any 
charge of theft of plant food. At 
least the loss of fertility in drain 
water is almost infinitesimal com¬ 
pared with that from surface wash. 
And the absorptive power of the land 
is so increased by drainage that sur¬ 
face wash will seldom occur except 
during violent or long-continued rains 
that are too rapid for the soil to absorb, 
or the drains to convey away, 
6th. Tile drainage largely prevents 
the frost’s lifting wheat and clover 
roots, winter killing them. This fact 
is abundantly attested. On my own 
farm there was no certainty of wheat 
or clover till the land was drained. 
John Johnston had met and published 
the same experience at least 10 
years before l laid a tile, and his ex¬ 
perience on this one. point was the 
main thing that led me to begin. 
The reason of the fact seems to be 
this. When a saturated surface 
freezes, “noar-frost” or “stool-frost” 
lifts a half-inch or so of the surface 
up an inch or more. Repeated freez¬ 
ing and thawing will lift even long 
clover roots, or stools of wheat, 
entirely out of ground and leave them 
to die. This does not occur on sandy 
or gravelly or tile-drained land, 
where the surface, even for a time, 
remains long saturated. 
7th. Tile drainage often saves 
much land and labor. A square or 
rectangular field with a crooked 
brook or swale running through it 
diagonally, is divided into two awk¬ 
ward ttiangle8 with crooked edges. 
There is twice as much turning in 
mowing, plowing, etc., besides the 
waste of land where the wet streak 
is. A field on my own farm had a 
crooked “dry brook” running through 
as seen iu Fig. 389. The fall is shown 
by the arrows. The branches, a. 
and b. joined at c. There was a small 
pond or water hole at e. and an out¬ 
let at d. at the line fence. It was im¬ 
possible to plow near the brook, or 
the land would wash iu high water. 
The field was drained essentially as 
in Fig. 390. Two catch-water tubs 
were sunk at f. and g. to take in 
the branches of the brook. The drain 
f. m. j. is of six inch tile, g. m. is four 
inch. The upper half-each L. L and h. 
k. are of four-inch tile, and the lower 
halves are of five-inch tile. The par¬ 
allel laterals empty chiefly into 1. L 
aud h. k. as shown in the figure. 
The entire surface of the field can 
now be plowed, mowed or reaped 
without obstruction or turning except at the 
ends. Except in sudden or heavy floods the 
draius will carry all the water; and even then 
the surplus from the brooks can be stored in 
two ponds (not shown in the cuts) till the 
drains can carry it. The field contains nearly 
40 acres and the drains are two rods apart. 
Of course there are more laterals than ap¬ 
pear in the figure, and there are more compli- 
