Vol. LXIV. No. 2881 . 
NEW YORK, APRIL 15, 1905. 
WEEKLY', $1.00 PER YEAR. 
TRUCK GROWING IN NORTH 
CAROLINA. 
GOOD SOIL AND CLIMATE. 
Vegefables and Cotton in Succession 
I have a farm of 125 acres just on 
the outskirts of New Bern, which is 
devoted to truck; have now (March 
18) finished planting peas, which are 
up, and potatoes have been planted 
about 10 days. I will give you the 
results of seven acres planted by me. 
I first planted the land in cabbage, but 
did not get a good stand. I used 2,000 
pounds of 7—7—7 fertilizer per acre, 
and about March 15 I barred off one 
side and put 1,000 pounds more of the 
same fertilizer to the acre and planted 
potatoes. When they came up they did 
not look very promising, but my cab¬ 
bage headed up very fast and I cut them 
off, shipped them to market and 
cleaned out the roots and stalks. The 
potatoes then grew very fast, and by 
June 10 I had them dug and to market. 
I then planted the land in corn on June 
12. I cut 746 barrel crates of cabbage, 
dug 426 barrels of potatoes and gath¬ 
ered 11 barrels or 55 bushels of corn 
per acre from the land. The money 
value of the crop was something in the 
neighborhood of $2,200. 
I have six acres of bottom land that 
I planted in Red Bliss potatoes, and 
dug 762 barrels. I followed the pota¬ 
toes with white corn and gathered 10>£ 
barrels per acre. I tried for an exper¬ 
iment two acres of land; first planted 
green peas, then Early Ohio potatoes, 
and followed the potatoes with cotton. 
I picked 200 bushel baskets of peas, 
and left 40 or more baskets on the 
vines, which I cut and got two tons of 
good peavine hay. I dug 120 barrels 
of potatoes and picked 2,946 pounds of 
seed cotton, which made me two bales 
(500 pounds) of lint. This all in one 
year. I planted 2)4 acres in cucum¬ 
bers and gathered 3,000 bushel crates, 
which I shipped, and had the market 
held could have gathered at least 1,000 
more bushels. Lands in this section, 
unless in very high state of cultivation, 
can be bought very low, and our 
climate is tempered by the Gulf 
Stream, and we have no very cold or 
disagreeable weather. For the first 
crop, lettuce seed is sown in beds out¬ 
doors about August 20, and set under 
cover from September 17 to 25. This 
crop is cut out between November 20 
and December 25. I follow this crop 
with beets, which are set about the 
first of February. Beets and lettuce 
are both set 9 x 12 inches apart. Beets 
are pulled about April 15, and by May 
10 cleaned up ; the beds are then plant¬ 
ed in cow peas to keep them shaded 
until the next crop is put in. The seed 
for Spring lettuce is sown about the 
first of November under cover, and set 
about the first of December; this crop 
is being cut now, and replaced with 
cucumbers, which are planted in cups 
5x5 under sash; these cups or pots 
are taken up and put in lettuce beds 
as fast as the lettuce is cut out. The 
NORTH CAROLINA LETTUCE FRAMES. Fig. 125. 
LETTUCE FRAME JUST PLANTED. Fig. 126. 
THE LETTUCE READY FOR MARKET. Fig. 127. 
cucumber plants are in bloom. These 
cups are not used any more. I have 
25,000 of them under sash with tomato 
and cucumber plants in them. While 
setting lettuce plants in beds the covers 
must be pulled on as fast as set to keep 
the sun from killing the plants, but 
must be kept well ventilated. After the 
plants are rooted begin to let them 
have the sun, first two or three hours 
in the morning, and the same late in 
the afternoon. Do this for three or 
four days, then I give all the sun I can 
get, but cover every night, unless there 
is no sign of frost. I also keep it cov¬ 
ered when we have cold winds. The 
beet seed is planted about December 1 
under sash in hotbeds. w. H. bray. 
North Carolina. 
HUMUS IN SOIL 
Too much cannot be said to impress 
our farmers with the importance of an 
abundance of humus in their soils. 
Good soils should have from 60 to 100 
tons of this organic matter in the sur¬ 
face seven inches. This is from six 
to 10 per cent. It is much easier to 
keep a good supply of humus in a 
heavy soil than in a sandy one, since 
oxygen more easily enters the loose 
soils, and causes a more rapid decom¬ 
position of the organic matter. But 
why is humus so important? Humus 
is the only variable constituent of soils. 
The clay and sand remain about the 
same all the time. This being the 
case, the only way to change the physi¬ 
cal condition of soil is to change the 
amount of humus in it, which can be 
done at will. Organic matter, besides 
being the main source of nitrogen, 
gives the soil improvement in tilth, 
temperature and moisture content; it 
prevents puddling, and much of the 
destructive effects of washing. If a 
handful of soil crumbles up nicely 
when taken from a fresh furrow in a 
clay or silt field it is in a good condi¬ 
tion of tilth. If it be sticky and cloddy 
the tilth is poor, the soil will rim to¬ 
gether badly after a rain, and it will 
bake upon drying. This peculiar crum¬ 
bly condition is brought about by natu¬ 
ral causes, acting upon certain soil 
constituents, the process being has¬ 
tened by tillage and sufficient moisture. 
In the crumbly or granular soil we 
find a large number of soil particles 
cohering together, thus forming gran¬ 
ules. This gives a heavy soil many of 
the advantages of a sandy soil without 
its disadvantages. The “gumbo” and 
“buckshot” soils are so-called because 
of this granular property. Freezing 
and thawing tends to develop this 
property, but an application of barn¬ 
yard manure will produce this effect 
to a greater extent than any other sin¬ 
gle factor. Hard rains tend to destroy 
this condition. 
The presence of large amounts of 
humus imparts to the soil a dark color. 
The dark soil absorbs the sun’s rays 
faster than the light soil, and thus the 
temperature is raised considerably 
more. 1 his difference in temperature 
