90 QUEENSLAND AGRICULTURAL JOURNAL. [1 Juny, 1899. 
General Notes. 
TO RAISE EARLY POTATOES. 
A very interesting experiment was made at the Queensland College last year 
with seed potatoes. A quantity of seed was kept in a shed under straw until 
the planting season came round. . They were then carefully sorted, all those 
which had not well sprouted being rejected. Some unsprouted seed was sown 
fully 2 weeks before that which had sprouted. When the former appeared 
above the ground as a straggling crop showing a very large percentage of 
misses, the latter were already fit for earthing up, and there was scarcely one 
miss per acre. 
We have seen it recommended that to secure an early crop, the seed should 
be kept in boxes in sand, where the potatoes will sprout much sooner than when 
left on the barn floor. ‘Both this and the method given above will ensure early 
sprouting of the tubers. 
THE BEST MANURE FOR POTATOES. 
Srxrzrpn tons of stable manure per acre will produce a larger crop than the 
most remunerative dressing of artificial manures. But employ a mixture of 
8 tons of stable manure and 3 cwt. of nitrate of soda, or an equivalent quantit 
of sulphate of ammonia, and a far greater yield will be obtained. In fact, such 
a dressing gives the greatest yield and most remunerative results of any. An 
artificial dressing for potatoes (if stable manure is unavailable) should contain _ 
nitrogen, phosphorus, and potash. Omit one of these, and the result will be 
a poor crop. The omission of nitrogen will cause the greatest loss, and that of 
potash the least. 
BLUESTONE, 
TERE is no reason why farmers should allow themselves to be imposed upon 
by any unscrupulous vendors of bluestone for pickling wheat. The true 
“English” bluestone is hard, has a crystalline fracture, and is of a deep-blue 
colour. Some “colonial” bluestone is of a pale-blue, or green, or even whitish 
colour. It is soft, and is of little or no value for pickling seed wheat. It is 
not bluestone at all; it is merely copperas or. greenstone—that is, sulphate of 
iron. 
SUGAR PLANTATIONS IN CUBA. 
Some of these Cuban places were of princely size and equipment. Near 
Matanzas there is a finca belonging to a gentleman named Mendoza. Standing 
on his front gallery, he pointed to a hill 15 miles away, and remarked that all 
the intervening country was his, and the green on that distant hillside was his 
cane, and beyond were other fields—all his. Near Baracoa is a plantation 
where the fields stretch for 10 miles on either side of the sugar-house. This, 
place, in spite of its great length, is only 4 miles wide, and the owner says he 
planned the shape of the fields so that this would result; and by planting it in 
twelve sections, beginning at one end and sowing each section a month or so 
later than its predecessor, he has secured a constant progression of maturing 
cane. Month by month his crop ripens, and month by month he cuts it off and 
takes it to the mill. His estate begins to grind about December or the early 
part of January, and continues till November. The grinding term here corre- 
sponds, approximately, to that observed on the Havemeyer plantations, where 
the mills really stop grinding only because the supply of material is exhausted. 
These places sometimes make as much as 50,000,000 Ib. of sugar per annum. 
One of them is equipped with three sets of triple effets, and has a crusher, 
besides nine rollers. The larger places use about 3,000 tons of cane per day~ 
