1902 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER. 
591 
POTATO CROPS IN NEW JERSEY. 
Good Goods but Low Prices. 
A HEAVY YIELD.—R. N.-Y. readers of the last 
volume will recall the account on page 787 of the 
large yields and phenomenal profits of potato grow¬ 
ers about Freehold, N. J., in a year of general failure 
of this staple crop. The unusual profits came from 
the good prices received for the potatoes, as the local 
yield of last year, remarkable in contrast to the short¬ 
age in most other parts of the State, is exceeded the 
present season as it has often been in the past, but 
the current price of 80 cents a barrel is in glaring 
contrast to the average of $2 received last year, and 
will crowd the gross receipts of the crop dangerously 
near the cost of production, though most of the grow¬ 
ers think they will “win out” a fair price for their 
labor. In remembrance of the satisfactory turnout of 
last year they take a cheerful view of the present low 
prices and will generally prepare for about the usual 
acreage next year. Potato growing is being reduced 
to something like a science on the clean, level, loamy 
farms near Freehold, the crop being planted, culti¬ 
vated, sprayed and harvested by machinery almost to 
the entire exclusion of hand labor. A recent drive 
among the growers with J. H. Denise, of Freehold, 
who studies the local needs of the soil and furnishes 
a large share of the chemical fertilizers so success¬ 
fully used, showed a number of “patches” of 20 acres 
or more each of surprising vigor and productiveness, 
clean and free from weeds and grass. Digging had 
commenced and the roads were full of teams hauling 
potatoes to the freight station and empty barrels back 
again. A photograph of a few rows of freshly-dug 
American Giants, just after the Hoover digger had 
passed, is shown in Fig. 239, this page. An eight-inch 
potato is not an expansive object as compared with 
a Jersey landscape, but the cut well 
shows the large size and thick nestling 
of these beautifully smooth and even 
tubers and the practical absence of 
small ones. These six rows as picked up 
filled a barrel every two rods, and the 
estimated yield was about 125 barrels 
(375 bushels) to the acre. This field 
was not noticeably better than a dozen 
others visited the same day. The acre¬ 
age is so large and the yield so generally 
good that a considerable amount of 
money will be returned the growers 
even at the seemingly disastrous price. 
One may fancy the potato growers of 
Maine, Wisconsin and the irrigated por¬ 
tions of Colorado smiling at the term 
“big yield” as applied to crops of 300 to 
400 bushels per acre, but we regard the 
annual output of such crops, on the 
worn soils of New Jersey and in cli¬ 
matic conditions not specially favorable 
to the potato plant as highly creditable. 
WELL FED FIELDS.—Intelligent observation of 
the local needs of the crop and thorough preparation 
and culture explain much, but after all the main fea¬ 
ture appears to be a systematic feeding with chemical 
plant foods. Stable manure will not do, as a good 
yield is only secured by its use at the expense of a 
scabby or “grubbed” crop. The Freehold district only 
came into prominence for potato production since the 
general introduction of chemical fertilization, 18 or 20 
years ago. Before that a marl-producing locality in 
an adjoining township had the reputation of turning 
out the finest potatoes in the central part of the State. 
Fifty-acre fields were not uncommon, and the total 
output was very large and profitable, but the one¬ 
sided action of the marl, furnishing little but lime 
and phosphoric acid, gradually reduced the yield and 
profits until potatoes are no longer the special crop. 
The Freehold growers on the other hand soon began 
the free use of complete or balanced fertilizers of the 
best obtainable makes, and have been able to main¬ 
tain and build up the productive powers of their land. 
The average application is not far from 1,000 pounds 
to the acre, put in the drill by the planter. A field 
was shown on which potatoes had been grown for 
seven consecutive years with no diminution of pro¬ 
duct, but the usual practice is to follow potatoes with 
wheat or rye seeded with Red clover and Timothy 
and plant potatoes again on the sod after two or three 
years’ interval. Crimson clover is often sown aTtter 
digging when it is desirable to plant potatoes again 
next season, and usually makes a strong growth, 
utilizing the excess fertility and returning a heavy 
addition of humus and nitrogen when turned under. 
THE VARIETY GROWN.—Much criticism is made 
on the quality of the American Giant potato almost 
exclusively grown here for market and the price re¬ 
ceived for this variety is usually less per barrel than 
for kinds considered better, but the Giant remains 
most profitable on account ol' its great vigor and large 
yield of handsome tubers. We tried one of these big 
fellows, measuring about nine inches by four, and 
found it to cook up fairly dry and very palatable. The 
seed potatoes are procured annually from northern 
New York, but it is the impression they are growing 
less true to type of late years, more round and off- 
shaped specimens occurring than formerly. The 
market for Freehold potatoes is practically at the 
farmer’s door, as buyers from the mining region of 
Pennsylvania pay on delivery at freight stations. 
Shipments of potatoes from Freehold have reached 
24 cars a day since the above was written, and the 
price has sagged to 75 cents a barrel. w. v. f. 
GREATEST FRAUD OF ALL 
Last April a fellow brought a chemical around and 
showed it to the fruit growers claiming that it would 
kill the tent-worm curculio and all similar pests, and 
above all, that it would surely kill any and all grubs 
in peach, apple and plum trees. When he showed his 
material to me he claimed it was an extract he ob¬ 
tained out of the swamp; that six different roots and 
herbs were contained in the preparation, and that it 
was very destructive to animal kingdom, while it 
would not harm plant growth in the least. Because 
I would not buy any he said I must think the people 
who had bought it were fools. I said no, not at all; 
simply because a person is not of the same opinion 1 
am I do not pretend to call him a fool. Nevertheless 
he caught his victims in the community and made 
sales ranging from two to twenty gallons at $2 per 
gallon. My neighbors used it and thought it just the 
thing for grubs in peach trees, as it would save a 
little labor, but to their sorrow and expensive experi¬ 
ence they found the trees dying. Only a short time 
ago one neighbor used it on 1,000 three-year peach 
trees, and told me yesterday morning that about 500 
of them were dead, and he thought the remainder 
would die, besides a lot of plum and pear trees. An¬ 
other neighbor who used it says that 50 per cent of 
the trees will die and all the new wood on his grape¬ 
vines. It is said that the mixture was petroleum and 
crude carbolic acid. The agent did not lie as he guar¬ 
anteed it to kill the grub, and so it did, because if the 
tree died the grub must also. h. v. 
Amity, N. Y. 
A SHORT TALK ABOUT BEAN CULTURE. 
Clark Allis, of Orleans County, N. Y., has had long 
experience as a bean grower. The following talk with 
him may interest the many who ask questions about 
beans: 
What is the best soil and how do you plant? 
For beans have as good ground as possible, and 
prepare it as for any crop (as good as possible and 
then a little more), plant in this section from last 
week in June to July 1, from one-half to three-fourths 
bushel of small beans to one bushel large beans per 
acre, with grain drill; rows 28 inches apart. Some 
plant White Wonder beans 24 inches apart. 
What fertilizers? 
On the rich soil which I use for beans I find dis¬ 
solved South Carolina rock about all that is needed. 
I use from 225 to 325 pounds per acre. 
What cultivation? 
As soon as the beans start a sprout (leave the 
ground without rolling after planting), go across the 
rows with a weeder, and when the beans are up well 
go across the rows again with the weeder, and then 
as many times as you wish. I have one piece of 17 
acres I have been over across the rows five times this 
season. 
Will the weeder answer on very weedy soil? 
If you have thistles or any weeds the weeder will 
not pull up use some cultivator that will cut the 
weeds instead of the weeder after the first two times 
with the weeder. 
How are they pulled and handled? 
When the majority of the bean pods get ripe pull 
either by hand or with one of the many machines 
made for the bean trade. If rainy turn every day if 
pulled by a machine, but if pulled by hand and a large 
handful set up with roots pressed tightly together, do 
not turn unless it looks like fair weather. When 
thoroughly dry draw and thrash at once by horses, or 
flail if you cannot get a bean machine, or leave in 
mow until sweat out. 
What is an average yield? 
An average is hard to strike. Sometimes beans 
will go 40 bushels, but not one time in 10,000. An 
avei’age for five years would not be over 14 or 15 
bushels. I have been raising beans all my life, and 
have never but once raised as high as 36 bushels per 
acre. 
“LAYING DOWN" PEACHES IN WINTER. 
The following article was printed in the Turf, Farm 
and Home of Waterville, Me. A correspondent asks: 
Is it practical to raise peaches under such embarassing 
conditions? Wouldn’t it be more business-like for farmers 
and orchardists to devote their energies to crops that 
could be raised with less difficulty? 
Growing peaches in Maine is uncertain business, 
but if peach trees can be protected during the cold 
season no other fruit trees would bear more generous¬ 
ly and surely. No effective means of preventing the 
winterkilling of the fruit buds has yet been devised 
that does not involve considerable labor and expense. 
Observations have shown that in seasons when peach 
buds are winterkilled in this latitude, they are largely 
destroyed before midwinter, and often before that 
time. It is obvious that protection, to be effective, 
must be given in the Fall. I have for 
many years made numerous experi¬ 
ments to discover some practicable 
means of protecting peach fruit buds 
from injury by cold during the Winter. 
Although every kind of available cover¬ 
ing material that suggested success, has 
been used in protecting the trees in an 
upright position, they have proved of 
some value, but not an entire success. 
For several seasons, in November, the 
roots on the north and south side of 
some of my trees have been loosened, 
the trees laid over on the ground, and 
some left uncovered, while others were 
covered with evergreen branches. I 
have had the fruit buds on some trees 
killed by heating; they were covered 
too closely. Trees treated in this way 
can be easily set up and will grow well 
and mature a crop. Many of the trees 
treated in this way were more than 
eight years old. 
Some of my peach trees I have protected by draw¬ 
ing the more widely-spreading branches in toward 
the main stem and surrounding them with evergreen 
boughs, which were held in place by cords passed 
around the tops, the bundles tnus formed being sup¬ 
ported by stakes driven in the ground about the trees. 
The trees protected in that way bloomed quite freely 
and produced a fair crop of fruit. Laying the trees 
down, staking or weighting them down, covering 
their tops witu evergreen brush and their roots with 
soil (the brush just thick enough to hold the snow) 
I have tried several Winters. The trees thus pro¬ 
tected blossomed quite freely, the flower buds opening 
in many cases while the buds on standing trees were 
still closed. The Winter of 1900 and 1901 was very 
unfavorable to peach trees here. The Winter just 
past has been more favorable. Peaches can be grown 
here, and in time will be grown at a profit. How to 
save the buds from destruction by extreme cold is an 
interesting question that science will yet answer. 
North Vassalboro, Me. r. g. tiiomas. 
We know that in parts of the North this plan is 
sometimes followed with success. We are not pre¬ 
pared to say that such methods would pay for com¬ 
mercial growing. We doubt it—but should expect 
that it would be used for garden culture. R. H. Lib- 
bey, who writes the following experience, is a very 
skillful fruit grower: 
I have had but little experience in laying down 
trees, but have found in all cases trees laid down do 
better than those exposed to the long severe Winters. 
We think it prevents black-knot. We have been told 
by some lecturers that there are three times in the 
season that the black-knot spreads, and Winter is 
one. If this is so, we escape that. Commencing with 
a tree small and cutting the roots off on one side it 
can be easily bent over and a stick of wood laid on 
the top. In Spring replace the tree with some bank¬ 
ing and a firm stake, to which tie the tree, and it will 
do all right. You can continue this year after year 
as the tree grows, keeping the roots cut on the one 
side. We do this on some tender varieties of plum 
trees and find it beneficial. It works the same with 
some varieties of bushes that will not stand our cold 
Winters. I have sometimes lost many raspberry and 
blackberry bushes by not laying them down and cov¬ 
ering them. n. a. i,ibhey. 
Newport, Me. 
