The Planters' banner. [volume] (Franklin, Attakapas Co., Lou.) 1849-1872, 1869-03-27
Farm and Garden.

| PLANT SoMETHIG.-A grape vine, straw
berry plant, rose bush, or even beet or
carrot-something to care for and watc
| and study day by day. It will give NOR
pleasure than any toy. besides adding som
thing 70 your knowledge. It may, perhaps
be the beginning of successful career as
fruit grower. q gardener or botanist.
Poultry should be furnished with materia
for making shells. Sand and gravel will no
answer. They are useful to grind up th'
coarse and other food, as it passes into th'
gizzard, but not for making egg shells
They must have something that affords phos
phate of lime. and nothing is better thar
pulverized bones.-[N. Y. Observer.
PREPARING THE GROUND FOR PLANTING
CoTToN.-Here is an article from the
Vicksburg Times, containing matters Of
especial interest to large class of GU,
readers:
Mr.. Editor-As the time approaches for
this important work, l wish to call the at
tention of those engaged in it to an error
which prevailed before the war to greater
extent than any fallacy where was so much
depending on its correction. It was a
saver of time, and was not visible to the
eye. though the results we're always felt,
but never attributed to the right cause. It
was that practice of leaving to the center of
the cotton ridge hard ground for the cotton
to take root in. Of all the crops grown
cotton requires the deepest and mellowest
soil to root in, having long top root, which
runs deep into the ground. How perfectly
absurd to suppose it could penetrate hard
soil and give more nutriment to the stalk
and its branches and fruit than it would in
the woll p.sl~ l~er;sea- and deeply piUwod
ground. Cotton has but few lateral roots,
and draws its sustenance from the depths of
the earth rather than the surface, and it
must be aided by the intelligent planter
reaching these sources of supply. But to
prove the folly and absurdity of this prac-
ice SO universally believed in, and will
give few facts.
In 1855 the writer had allowed an i'm
nense bank of cotton seed to collect at his
,in-house, and not having time to spread it
IN distant parts of the field, he had it hauled
IN is acre cut close by. which had been
cultivated for fifty years. Some of the
,est teams were put on this cut and plowed
n the middle of the row, as deep furrow as
possible. Then the seed was thrown in
his furrow. and filled in to the top; he
hen had the ridges thrown up with this |
'otted cotton seed in the center This was
Ill done in March. About the 1st of April |
he cotton was planted in the usual way, |
With many misgivings amongst the laborers |
's to the results, and the overseer said that |
he cotton would die out. When the top
DOT reached the cotton seed beneath. the |
ottOn grew off beautifully, was the first to /
loom. the first to mature, and the first to
pen. and on the first of September we gath
red fifteen hundred pounds of seed cotton
the acre, and picked it again lst October,
'hen we gathered fifteen hundred pounds
,ore to the acre, and had another picking
ss@ !. q ss@s ssssa 81 s @af'Ss aaR9Eed sld
ear 24 bales. B.
IMPORTANCE OF FARMlNG.-We clip the
ollowing very sensible remarks from the
olumns Of the New York Working Farmer.
they ere as true here as in New York:
Young men from the farms, if you have
net with disappointments in your first essay
It professional or mercantile life, and do |
lot see your way clearly to success, 60 back !
o the soil which suffers for laborers. to the
ertile acres which remain untitled because
here is an increasing dearth of skilled work |
men in the most healthful and permanently
productive of all employments-before it is
90 late. In proportion to our increase Of
population. the ranks of agriculture are
sadly deficient in talent and numbers, and
ire growing thinner every year. The
source of all wealth is the soil, and the
nations can only grow rich as the latter is
made more and more productive, while the
waste places are reclaimed and an increased
,rea is brought under cultivation. Yet the
). go-betweens"-the worlds carriers
hose who live by simply COZ 'eying the pro-
ducts of the farm to the mandatory. and
rice rersd. and others who derive q profit
directly or indirectly from this traffic. are
in q fearful ratio compared with
Lhe real producers of wealth, the tillers of
The soil, whose products would make the
land wax fat with riches. If this process Of
goes on-if the ranks of agri-
culture are not kept filled with competent
may look ont for speedy
decline of our national wealth.
THE CHINESE TEA PLANT SUCCESSFULLY
IN TENNEssEE.-We copy as
follows from the Knoxville Press and
Herald:
We were shown yesterday, at the Market
SQUARE drug store, some seed of the Chinese
tea plant, and were told that the tea plant
was ip successful cultivation some ten miles
above Knoxville, on the farm Of Capt. James
Campbell, where it has been grown for
about ten years. We further learn that
East Tennessee tea drinkers can easily
raise their own tea with very little cost or
trouble. The plant is a deep evergreen
shrub, and grows about FIVE feet high. It
is hardy, and needs no protection from
frosts. It bears an abundant crop, with
beautiful. fragrant flowers in October. The
following season it natures q seed. some
what resembling our native hazel, and grows
az readily The vigor and hardness of this
plant, and its adoption to this climate, have
been tested.
We learn that the above plants were dis
tributed through the Agricultural Seed De-
par.ment at Washington, each Congress
sional district receiving few plants for ex-
pertinent. Capt. Campbell received the
plants through Mr.. Maynard for this dis
trict. He has fully established their adapt
ness to our climate, and has succeeded
beyond al expectation. He informs us that
the tea produced from the leaves of this
plant very much resembles in flavor the tea
from the Young Hysen plant.
TEXAS CATTLE, MEAT, ETc.--In France
$4,000 tons of meat are consumed in a
year, in England 1,660,OOO tons, and in the
United States 1000. 900. In the United
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