The Wyandot pioneer. (Upper Sandusky, Ohio) 1853-1868, 1854-06-08
THE PIONEER.
AGRICULTURAL
Sleeping Seeds.


Soaking seeds in liquids before planting
them, has been practiced with more or les
advantage. termination may be consid
erably FASTENED simply by immersing thu
seed twenty four hours in water at q tenn
perature of sixty-fve to seventy degrees
BY this means crop may be forwarded ii
growth several days. Where seeding has
been delayed gain may thus be effected
of no small consequence. When the sol
is in moist state, the soaked seed vii
come up with as much certainty RS if pu
in the ground dry; but tifthe soil is very
dry, there is risk with seed in which ger.
mination has commenced. The dry earth
may absorb the moisture of the seed, thus
causing shrinkage which weakens OIL
destroys its vitality. We should therefore
be cautious about soaking seeds in time o.
severe drouth.
But other advantages have been claim
cd in regard TO soaking seeds 1t has been
held that the growth of crops may be
stimulated and the final yield increased by
sleeping seeds in solutions ofvarious sub
stances. This subject received much at
tention several years ago Some persons
carried the idea so far as to claim that
seeds could be so doctored that bountiful
crops might be produced without any 9TH
or manure, even in the most sterile soil.
Different kinds of sleeps were invented,
and quacks and charlatans sold the re-
cipes for making them to people who had
more credulity than Judgment.
TIE substances chiefly employed for
this purpose were nitrate of soda, nitrate
cfpotash (salt petre, muriate ofammonia
[salammoniac, sllphate of ammonia, &c
Ammonical liquor, which is produced by
the distllation of coal in the manufacture
of gas, has also been used AS a steep for
seeds. Hannah, in his Essay on Waste
manures, describes this liquid as "an i'm
pure solution of the carbonate of ammonia
and is the very gas wch is evolved during
the decomposition of animal substances,
and which escapes from our heaps
during fermentation" The results of
soaking seeds i'll this livuor, have some
times been highly favorable. A gentle
man who made some experiments with it,
ten years since, stated to the writer that
corn and oats soaked in the liquor thirty
hours before planting, showed a broader
and greener leaf, produced larger heads
and ears, and yielded twenty per cent.
more than that with no application-the
treatment being in all other respects SINH
lar.
Tie effect Of al these substances, how
ever, appears to hay e been various, and to
have been governed in some instances by
unknown causes. In general, the prefer
ence after repeated trials, was given to
muriate of ammonia. Indian corn appear
cd to derive considerable advantage from
ssolution prepared nearly as follows:
An ounce ofmurate of ammonia is dis
solved in sufficient water to cover quart
Of corn-the corn TO remain in the solution
twenty -four to thirty six hour, at a tenn
pcrature of sixty five degrees.
When planted, it may be "dried off, by
mixing plaster or dry sand with it till the
grains will readily scperate, either in drop
ping by hand or with seed drill AS it
Is advisable in all cases to ascertain the
precise result in any experiment, the pre-
pared seed might be planted in alternate
rows, or lots of the same extent with others
To which the solution was not applied-the
soil and cultivation being as nearly alike
as possible. Let the product of the differ
ent lots be carefully weighed and compar-
ed, and the result will Indicate the value of
the solution Boston Cdhuotm.