142 
THE CULTIVATOR. 
Regarding the mode of spreading the dung —whether above or under 
the sets—some difference of opinion prevails ; for although the latter 
is the method usually adopted, and it may be rationally supposd that, 
as the roots shoot rather laterally than upwards, it is from the manure 
placed underneath that they extract their nutriment, yet it is supposed 
by many persons that, if the land be light and dry, it answers better 
to lay the manure in furrow's above the plants ; and some farmers seem 
to think the manner of its application immaterial. According to an 
experiment made with the utmost degree of attention, under the di¬ 
rection of the Board of Agriculture, the former, however, appeared! 
to have the advantage of five to four in its favor i the produce of an 
equal weight of sets, and quantity of manure, being—when laid over 
the dung.............. 105 lbs. 4 oz. 
Under the dung, -... 84 “ 3 “ 
Such are the ordinary modes of culture usually adopted throughout 
most parts of the United Kingdom; but a novel plan, which deviates 
in some essential particulars from those generally employed, has lately 
been brought into notice by Mr. Knight, the very intelligent President 
of the Horticultural Society; and, as the very interesting account which 
has been published by the society may yet be unknown to many of our 
readers, we here transcribe it, and beg earnestly to call it to the serious 
attention of every farmer who is engaged in that branch of husbandry. 
“ The experiments were made upon different varieties of potatoes; 
but as the results were in all cases nearly the same, I think that I 
shall most readily cause the practice I recommend to be understood, 
by describing minutely the treatment of a single variety only, which 
I received from the Horticultural Society, under the name oif ‘ Lank- 
man’s Potato” a tall sort raised some years siiice in Flanders. 
“ The soil in which I proposed to plant being very shallow, and lying 
upon a rock, I collected it with a plough into high ridges of four feet 
wide, to give it an artificial depth, A deep furrow was then made 
along the centre and highest part of each ridge; and in the bottom of 
this, whole potatoes, the lightest of which did not weigh less than four 
ounces, were deposited, at only six inches distance from the centre of 
one to the centre of another. Manure, in the ordinary quantity, was 
then introduced, and mould was added, sufficient to cover the potatoes 
rather more deeply than is generally done, 
“ The stems of potatoes, as of other plants, rise perpendicularly un¬ 
der the influence of their unerring guide, gravitation, so long as they 
continue to be concealed beneath the soil; but as soon as they rise 
above it, they are, to a considerable extent, under the control of another 
agent, light. Each inclines in whatever direction it receives the greatest 
quantity of that fluid, and consequently each avoids, and appears to 
shun, the shade of every contiguous plant. The old tubers being large, 
and, under the mode of culture recommended, rather deeply buried in 
the ground, the young plants in the early part of the summer never 
suffer from want of moisture; and, being abundantly nourished, they 
soon extend themselves in every direction till they meet those of conti¬ 
guous rows, which they do not overshadow on account of the width of 
the intervals. 
“ The stems being abundantly fed, owing to the size of the old tubers, 
rise from the ground with great strength and luxuriance, support well 
their foliage, and a larger breadth of this is thus, I think, exposed to the 
light during the whole season, than under any other mode of culture 
which I have seen; and, as the plants acquire a very large size early 
in the summer, the tubers, of even very late varieties, arrive at a state 
of perfect maturity early in the autumn. 
“ Having found my crops of potatoes to be in the last three years, 
during which alone I have accurately adopted the mode of culture 
above described, much greater than they had ever previously been, as 
well as of excellent quality, I was led to ascertain the amount in weight 
which an acre of ground, such as I have described—the soil of which 
was naturally poor and shallow—would produce. A colony of rabbits 
had, however, in the last year done a good deal of damage, and phea¬ 
sants had eaten many of the tubers which the rabbits had exposed to 
view; but the remaining produce per acre exceeded 539 bushel, of 82 
lbs. each; two lbs. being allowed in every bushel on account of a very 
small quantity of earth which adhered to them.” 
‘• The preceding experiments were made with a large and productive 
variety of potato only; but I am much inclined to think that I have 
raised, and shall raise in the present year, nearly as large a produce 
per acre of a very well-known small early variety—the ‘ashleaved 
kidney potato.’ Of this I selected in the present spring the largest 
tubers which I could cause to be produced in the last year; and I have 
planted them nearly in contact with each other in the rows, and with 
intervals, on account of the shortness of their stems, of only two feet 
between the rows. The plants at present display an unusual degree of 
strength and vigor of growth, arising from the very large size--for that 
variety—of the planted tubers; and as large a breadth of foliage is ex¬ 
posed to the light by the small, as could be exposed by a large variety; 
for I have always found the amount of the produce, under any given 
external circumstance, to be regulated by the extent of foliage which 
was exposed to light; and I have uniformly found that to obtain crops 
of potatoes of great weight and excellence, the period of planting should 
never be later than the beginning of March.” 
The produce of this small early variety, in fact, very considerably 
I exceeded that of the' large one first mentioned—being per acre 665 
■ bushels of 82 pounds—and both so far exceeded the ordinary crop's 
[which had been previously raised, except in very rare cases, that doubts 
j were entertained of the exactness of Mr. Knight’s conclusions, and expe¬ 
riments,, it will be seen, were made in the garden of the society in or- 
jjder to obtain further evidence. 
SEED, 
I It has been ascertained by repeated trials that every Variety of the 
potato, when propagated during a series either by cuttings from the 
root or by the whole tubers, is subject to degenerate: in some, the qua¬ 
lity remaining good, after the produce in quantity has become defec- 
| live, whilst with others, it disappears with the vigor of the plant. In 
I order to obviate this inconvenience, and to preserve those species which 
| are known to be valuable, farmers occasionally raise them from the 
seed contained in the apples which grow upon the stalk; for which 
purpose, a few large ripe apples should be chosen from a healthy plant, 
and be carefully preserved apart, in some dry sand, during the winter. 
| The seed is then picked out, and usually sown in rich garden ground 
in the month of April; but it is more expedient to sow it in a hot-bed 
early in March, to expose the shoots gradually to the open air, and to 
plant them out in a bed of rich earth in the middle of May. In the 
month of October, these seedlings will produce tubers, the largest of 
which are to be gathered, and planted out, in the following spring, af 
a few inches distance from each other. When they rise about'two 
inches above ground, they should be covered with two or three inches 
of mould, and managed in the same mannner as if grown from the old 
potato. 
When arriving at maturity, they should be continually and carefully 
examined, to discover those which appear the earliest in coming to 
perfection; which will be denoted by the decay of the haulm. These 
should be taken up, and in like manner those of a later growth; but 
those which show extraordinary vigor should be selected, and the pro¬ 
duce of each sort being again sown in the ensuing year, a correct judg¬ 
ment may be formed of the respective properties of each. The pro¬ 
cess is thus so slow and troubslesome, that it takes three years to bring, 
any new variety to maturity, and a fourth before the real properties of 
the root can be correctly ascertained. The product will also some¬ 
times disappoint the expectations of the grower; for although, gene¬ 
rally speaking, the major portion of the crop will be found of the same 
quantity as the original stock, yet it occasionally fails, and new varie¬ 
ties are constantly produced, differing in both colour, flavor, size, and 
the periods of ripening. Thus, it appears from an experiment lately 
made in the garden of the London Horticultural Society, upon twenty- 
five seedling varieties reared by Mr. Knight, that the estimated pro¬ 
duce varied from one to upwards of eighteen tons per acre; all of dif¬ 
ferent qualities. The best produced from a single tuber twenty-seven 
large and seven small roots, the aggregate weight of which upon an 
acre of ground it was supposed would equal 17 tons 9i cwt. and being 
both large, solid, mealy, white, well-flavored, and in substance and ap¬ 
pearance much resembling the white yam, has been named by the so¬ 
ciety, after Mr. Knight’s country-seat, the “ Downton yam potato.” 
SETS AND TUBERS. 
We have already stated that in the common course of field-husband¬ 
ry, potatoes are invariably planted for a crop either by depositing the 
entire root, or cuttings from it, called “ sets.” No objection appears 
indeed to have been commonly entertained against the planting of the 
whole root, or “tuber”—’except on the score of economy, though pro¬ 
bably no other advantage will be thereby gained; for every tuber con¬ 
tains many beads, or “eyes”—from each of which a shoot will spring, 
and by sowing these separately, or in cuttings containing two or more to¬ 
gether, a saving is made in the quantity; but an extraordinary opinion 
is entertained regarding the best method of performing this operation. 
Among numberless experiments which have been made with a view 
to compare the produce of plantations of different sizes of whole tubers, 
and sets from different sizes of cuttings, those of entire potatoes report¬ 
ed to the Bath Society were generally stated to be superior. Dr. An¬ 
derson found that the crop was in some measure proportionate to the 
weights of the sets; and that it was more profitable to plant small po¬ 
tatoes than small cuttings. Others, however, found that the difference 
in acreable produce, between large and small, cut or uncut potatoes for 
sets, was quite immaterial; but that the saving in the quantity sown, 
was so much in favor of the cuttings as to require only twenty bushels, 
while whole potatoes consumed thirty-seven bushels per acre. Yet, 
according to a report made to the Dublin Society of Agriculture, it was 
stated, on comparison with sets cut from reasonably large and small 
tubers, that the produce in favor of the former was as 84 to 64; and 
another well informed gentleman states, “he has uniformly found in all 
his experience that large sets of potatoes made a more productive return 
