The Democratic advocate. [volume] (Westminster, Md.) 1865-1972, 1869-06-24
geritiltaral department.



Every Intelligent farmer o. gardner al
nits that luxariant cropof cereals, root
o. vegetable Of any kind cannot be raised
~ soil oTcrrun With weeds. Yet vary Few
tase elieeinal steps 10 eradicate them. The
reason d Inc great superiority Of drill hus-
sauafy over The broadcast system is that it
adpAs The pillow, dFill-harrow, cultivation
sss,., 10 work between the drills while the
pIauis are growing, by which means thesoil
Is stirred up aud pulyerized and weeds de-
slroyod. The faculty Of wedding drilled
crops, and the line preparation OF the soil
by this mode Of tillage, gave rise TO the
various systems Of rotation Of crops, for it
became evident that every field on the farm
might be Improved by the production Of
we'll manured and well managed green crops
in drills. Each cereal crop has its partic-
ular green crop, after which il thrives best.
Thus, afier turnips, barley succeeds best !
Ailcr grass, oats; after potatoes and beams
wheat When several crops Of wheat, or
any other cereal are raised on the same soil
without the Intervention Of green crop
weeds grow up, ripen their seeds and es-
tahlish themselves firmly in the soil. In
harvesting The crop, the weeds cannot be
separated from ID; afterwards they become
mixed with the gram and are ground up
with ii (; thus plalterating the 6oor, Sclue
Of the seeds Of the weeds are blown out with
the chaif aud mixed with tho manure in the
barn yard, carried out 10 the fields and again
sown with the crops, thus perperuating their
ncxioas species at the expense of every
kind Of cultivated crop.
Ifrotation Of crops and drill husbandry
had been universally praciiced in the United
. States for the last fifty years, we would moi
now have one believer in the theory Of trans
mutation Of wheat into chess, because this
noxiops weed would find no abiding plae,
under the improved system Of husbandry,
None but puresced would be sown, and such
thing as wheat after wheat would not be
heardof Therapid growth Of chessin som,
fields, and the humiliation Of the whcai
plants, may be accounted for by the discov
cries Of Brugman and Maccaire, who asser
1 that The roots Of plants throw out certain
matters called excretions which are poison
Gus 20 other plants, and this opinion wa
endorsed BY De Candolle, who founded OF
Ia theory Of rotations. He supposed Tia
these excretions, although injurious to III,
same family as that from which they pro
coed, might afford nourishment to others o
different class. Although this opinion
has given rise to much controversy, it is III,
only reasonable manner Of accounting 70
the absorption Of the wheat plant by chess
It sometimes looks as if whole fields Of tn
former were poisoned and preyed upon b.
this tyrant Of the neglected iillage field
We have sometimes seen roots of perennia
weeds, such as docks, coltfoot, ETC., throw
into the manure heap, and as it often hap
pens that they are not sufficiently decom
posed when the manure is turned out on III
tiilage fields, these roots grow and perpet
aate their injurious race. Roots of peren
NAL weeds and stems, and branches Of an
nunis, bienuials and pcrennials that hay
seed ripe, or nearly so, should be burned
that b the only safe way Of getting rid {
them.