The Hillsdale standard. [volume] (Hillsdale, Mich.) 1851-1909, 1855-03-13
Fold Operations, &c.

As you have now begun new year, few
remarks with regard to your field operations,
your farm economy, and the general manage
ment of your affairs may not be amiss.
Should the field you intend for corn next
spring be tenacious clay land, and opportuni-
ty should offer through the winter to do 80,
have it plowed, so as that its texture may be
meliorated by the frost; if such land be
sound, that's, not wet, plow it at least inches
deep, lay your furrows at an angle Of about
As degrees, in order that they may lay, and
thus expose the greatest possible surface to
the action of the weather.
In the spring, as soon as the ground is suf-
ficiently dry to permit your team to go on it
without poaching by the horses, have it rolled,
then apply your manure, and cross plow it in
about A inches in depth, then roll it and har-
row until you have a fine tilth. Recollect,
however, that clay soil should never be plow-
ed while in wet state, or when very dry,
but when in moist condition.
AS corn requires to be grown either in a
very fertile soft or if the soil be not natural
ly fertile, that if it be heavily maNured--as it
requires much food, it is almost vain to ex-
pect good crop unless there be in the soil
the means of sustenance.. And as much is
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having large fields of corn to induce you to
put in greater extent Of acres than you can
manure well unless your land be really rich.
To cultivate corn in an impoverished soil,
unless it be generously manured, so far as
the prospect of product is concerned, is allu-
sorry. In laying out your work for the year,
see to it that you do not overcrop yourselef.
Let the crops which you may put in be with
in the ability of your force to cultivate thor
oughly and well,
Make your calculations to get in both your
oats and corn timely, and nine times out of
ten these crops, when early pitched succeed
best. When we speak of the early planting
of corn and sowing of oats, we do not mean
that either should be put in before the earth
is sufficiently warm to encourage the prompt
termination Of the seed, but we do mean,
that as soon as the earth is sufficiently warm
to cause the seed to sprout and vegetate, that
both crops should be put in. You should
exert your utmost endeavors to manure every
acre that you may cultivate in spring crop.
If the supplies Of your barn and stable
yards are not equal to this, add to them suf-
ficient quantity of woods mould, pine shat
ters, or marsh, river, or creek mud, to give
you 20 horse loads per acre, form the whole
into compost, and let it remain in bulk three
weeks, when decomposition will have suffi-
ciently taken place to render the mass avail
able TO your crops.
If barn yard and stable supplies are not
competent to enable you to add the requisite
number of loads to give you % loads per
acre, add 100 to $50 pounds of Peruvian
Guano, and one bushel Of plaster to every
twenty loads that you put into the compost;
and we risk nothing in saying that should the
season prove auspicious, you will have large
crop of both corn and oats, provided the
former be cultivated judiciously and well, and
the cultivator and hoes be used instead OF the
plow in its cultivation.
The volatile part of manure-that part
which feeds the plant, gives it vitality and
growth, is often, wasted and given to the air
by being exposed by the plow in the course
of the culture Of corn crop, instead of be-
ing left buried inthe soil to feed the roots Of
the plants. Every plowing after corn crop
is pitched serves only to rob the plants OF
their food; for the moment the ammonical
compounds become exposed to the immediate
action Of the of the atmosphere--to heat
and moisture-decompo takes place,
and tho amonia flies of and becomes lost TO
the whole crop to which 1t has been applied.
Before spring you should study out the
system you mean to pursue through the year,
be careful in forming that system, let 1t be
formed in accordance with your resources,
aud having, after mature reflection adopted