Lancaster daily intelligencer. [volume] (Lancaster, Pa.) 1864-1928, 1880-07-29
LOCAL INTELLIGENCE.
TOBACCO AND ITS CULTURE.

"A SHAuaOlO CVauuaI IOE Toe Il tAf"0Ts
We have received copy of 2S-page
pamphlet published by G. W. Haverstick,
of New Providence, this county, titled
Tobacco and it's Culture" being COM
plete treatise on the culture and manage
ment of tobacco from the seed to the case.
The author, who has had twenty-five
years. experience in tobacco culture, lays
down very clear rules for the government
Of the efower, commencing with the selec-
ton and sprOutins of the seed, and gong
OH through the whole process of preparing
the seed bed, sowing the seed, managing
the plants, destroying the worms, topping,
cutting, hanging, stripping and casing to-
tobacco.
The following extract is scasonablc and
give an idea Of the scope and character of
the work.
Topping Tobacco.
On thin land where the plnnt does not
have vigorous growth, top it at from six
to eight leaves, but in ordinary lanG, where
the plants look thriving, you can if your
tobacco has not been planted too late, ma
turc from eight to ten leaves md in very
strong rich land, from twelve to fourteen
good leaves on the stock, but in no case
should it exceed that number rs you will
learn, l hope, before we close, By following
up the method given in this work before
we get to the case. l would prefer
to top just after a rain, but it
is poor policy to wait for a
topping. The plant which
.ol~4 IN,
leaves, top to eight, and the one you
think will bear twelve top to ten, and so
on, but in no case let more than fourteen
leaves, besides the three lower ones, on any
one stock, and the sooner the topping is
Iuircd number of leaves, the better able
very important point in topping tobacco is
this: do not run over your patch, but
when your tobacco is ready for topping,
take it clean as you 20 and top each stock
on it's own merits according to the advice
given. Top each stalk for itself regardless
of the next one, as for various causes they
may not be of the same size. If the
stock be small, top it ut any
rate, it will give bigger and
better leaves, if not SO many of them, and
they all have the same time to mature in,
and will ripen more evenly. This is far
better than to have the small stocks two
weeks later, which would give you consid-
erable trouble when you come to cut your
tobacco. Ii your tobacco be all topped at
one time it is sure to ripen, and it is better
to have leaves ON one size than stocks.
Another advantage Your tobacco when
topped at one time, OF nearly SO, will ripen
and cure much moro uniformly in color.
: = : The grower will see soon af-
ter topping, especially in wet season, the
shoots or suckers appear, which must also
be attended to: however, do not give
yourself any trouble about them
until the first six suckers appear
which will he on top OF the stalk !;
then they should be broken off very care
fully, so Us not to injure the plant. Suck
ers do not retard the growth OF the plant
materially until they become large. You
will find that each and every leaf will send
out q sucker, which must be broken OFF in
time before getting too large. The stalks
begin to throw out suckers ut the top or
where the bud stem was first broken off,
and continue to go down the stalk until
they get to the lower leaves which deter
mines the time when the stock is ripe
You can with safety cut when
the lower leaves send out suckers from
two to five inches long, and the leaves
thicken up and become brittle. There is
more injury in letting your tobacco become
too ripe than by cutting too green. You
must, however, guard against both ex-
tremes as neither is good.
Equally minute and explicit rules are
giving for cutting and harvesting the
crop, and many other useful hints are
given in the pamphlet, that cannot fail to
be of great advantage to the amateur to-
bacco growers, in whose interest the little
work is more especially written.