The Camden journal. [volume] (Camden, S.C.) 1866-1891, 1869-06-03
AGRICULTURE.
PEANUTS, POPS, SAPS, &C.


The following communication from
an intelligent observer, will be read
with great interest. We shall be glad
to publish the experience of other gen
tlemen on this subject. The remedy
proposed is thus stated:
NANsEMoND, April 10, '69.
Editor Norfolk Journal:-Dear Sir
In your issue of May 4th there is note
signed "Farmer," from this county, re-
questing information in regard to pea
nuts, pops and shells without kernels
and "saps." Shells with immature
kernels, which are filed with water al
the time of digging, turn black in Gu
ring and frequently ferment, and spoil
q whole crop, when placed in bulk i'm
properly assorted or cured.
Several years experiments in cultiva-
ting peanuts in Spe to three acre patch
es and in different kinds of soil have
convinced mo that this "eaprcious crop"
"A very expensive one to cultivate
properly, and very profitable and ex-
hausting one-ou some soils too poor for
corn, will yield handsome returns when
the proper attention is given to it in
:he way of manures or nourishment.
Both "pops" and "saps" are produced
by tho same cause, "a0ant Of hme," to
enable the vine to assimilate the vege-
table matter in the soil and develope to
maturity the kernel.
Planting too late or "aoant Of time,
for the kernels to make, is another pro-
life source.
Replanting peas after the tenth Of
June is labor lost.
The richer the land, as where trucks
have been grown, the heavier the lime
should be applied. Twenty, thirty to
fifty bushels of she'll lime will pay best.
On very poor sand banks, wood earth
in drills, with shell lime will make hand
some returns, for labor expended.
Dark, heavy, rich land without lime
will give fine tops, but no bright sale
able peas; even with lime, the peas will
be dark.
Reddish clays, with lime, yield fine
solid, heavy peas, which would be A No.
but for the "pinkish" tinge given
them by the soil.
Medium soils with gravel and sand,
with a clay subsoil or yellowish porous
subsoil, mixture Of felay and sand, with
top soil easily worked after rains, such
as truckers consider first rate for carly
vegetables, seem from my experience
to be the home for peanuts.
On such land the past year, near
where strawberries are growing, over
one hundred bushels of peanuts to the
acre were grown without other fertil'
izers than twenty bushels Oh she'll lime
to the acre. The,crops which preceded
it forsome years were-sweet potatoes
in 1865, cotton in 1866, corn in 1867,
peanuts in 1868 now followed in 1869
by sweet potatoes again. The writer
would suggest caution in planting large
crops on any one field until an expert
mental test of an acre has been tried
lime freshly burned, Stacked and i'm
msdiately placed in drills with wood
earth, or narrowed in when the land is
sufficiently strong, either broadcast or
in drills, as may be most convenient.
Some gentlemen in Surry, who have
tried i'll the past year, say that lime,
sown freely on the pea rows, at the Sc
cond workings in June, yielded larger
and better developed crops of peas than
the same amount placed in drills under
the peas at planting time.
ALLOW me to suggest to your readers
and your correspondent Farmer" d