Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1870-03-30
DaiIp uataebre Aoarlml.
CARE OF STOCK.
GIVE PLANTS GOOD FOOD AT THE
ZEE RIGHT TINE.

In very interesting and valuable paper
on Autumn Cultivation and Manuring, >
by p. Barnes, Esq, published in the Maine
Agricultural Report for 1866, he says
1T is precisely with young plants as
with young animals. Both are nourished
by food Both must have their food at the
moment they begin to live, and it must be
of the right kind and in the right form.
Wild plants have their food supplied by
nature, and, accidents excepted, it is al
WAYS suited to their condition. The annual
crops of our agriculture must have their
food furnished by the hand of man. If
they begin to grow at the middle of May,
but have no proper supply of food till the
middle of June, their life is of doubtful
utility. The farmer who puts into the
ground bv the side of the seed quantity
of material for plant food. which he knows
nevertheless, win not be fit for food until
some weeks after the germ has put forth
from that seed, might take lesson from
himself, as a cattle-grower, and consider
the good sense of that practice, by which
he aims, above all things, to secure rapid
and vigorous early growth of his young
animals. 1t is not by compelling them to
acaa for their food.
1.-The entire difference between profit
and loss, both in the raising of crops and
the growing Of cattle. often depends upon
the single question, whether or not the
crop or the animal was ,ceH fed at the earli-
est periods of its growth If it was, there
is ground for a calculation of profits-if
not, the result may be q laborious and ex-
pensive loss
A striking illustration of the truth of the
above is furnished by the results of some
experiments conducted the past season
(S69) by Dr. f. Clark of Portland. on his
farm in Westbrook With the design to
test the comparative merits of various phos-
phatic nianures, he applied to u given
number of rows of sweet corn the Cum
berland Bone Company's Superphosphate.
To the same number of other rows he APP
piled the same quantity of "Croasdale's
Superphosphate, and to another similar
number he applied fine ground bone and
unleached ashes, (the latter having been
wet and mixed sometime previously so as
to be well digested together.) Where the
first named was put the crop was alum
dant. the ears numerous, well filled and
ripe in good season. Where both the 9th
ers wercapplied the crop was scanty, the
ears. few and meagre, and eighteen days
letter than where the Cumberland Super
phosphate was applied.
. 1t is well known that good superphos-
plate hastns the ripening of corn, usually
from ten to fourteen days; so much so in
fact as frequently to make the difference
between a good crop and failure by rea-
son of this effect alone, without counting
in the increased quantity obtained. The
past season was unfavorable for corn, and
the peculiar efficacy of a good phosphate
manure was more than usually manifest.
A great many farmers, in various parts
of the State, credit the Cumberland Super
phosphate with almost the whole of their
measure of success with this crop the past
year, as without its aid they say the crops
would not have paid for harvesting.
In this case, as DIR. Clark remarked, the
bare statement of the fact hardly tells the
whole story. since it should be said, that
the impetus given to the plants in their
earlier stages by suitable food at The proper
time, enabled them to get such vigor of
growth and extension of roots that, when
the dry spell came, they foraged wider and
deeper for food and moisture, and so were
enabled to pass the drouth without injury !;
whereas, the Others had to wait, and SO
long, that had not the frost held off unusu-
ally late they would not have reached
maturity before it came.