The Vermont watchman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1883-1911, 1884-05-28

mere thing Of such a piece, followed by thor
ough tillage to the proper depth, will often
restore to it the capacity to produce crops
with very little fertilization. When the
land was first cleared the roots of the big
old trees which had been cut off remained
in the ground, and, as they decayed, left
channels through which the surplus water
Of the soil rapidly settled away. In time,
by treading of teams and the sealing &C.
ton of the pillow, these channels become
closed, and the land, without being really
exhausted, became unproductive. 1t is
absolutely impossible to make such land
do what it should do, in the way of crop
production, without restoring the water
ways by which the surplus moisture was
conveyed away, and the soil left open so
that the air can penetrate it and " liven
it up" Something can be done, it is true,
by judicious fall blowing and the opening
of surface drains, but this is only a pal
liative and not cure.
On lighter soils, with natural drainage,
when beans fail to yield satisfactorily, the
application of manure is as necessary for
the bean crop as for any other. The no
ton that white beans are satified with
poor soil is silly fiction. Look how
they grow and yield in the richest garden
soil. That alone should satisfy the OBJ
server that beans profit by the enrichment
of the soil in which they grow as much
as any crop we have. Beans respond
very strongly to heterogeneous fertilizers,
and naturally SO, since the seeds are
among the very richest of all vegetable
products in nitrogen, and they must get
il from the soil in the very short season,
between frost and frost, in which they
must be grown. The. best crop of beans
we ever saw was grown on slaughter
house manure. But besides nitrogen they
must be we'll supplied with potash and
phosphoric acid. No matter how rich
soil may be in any one or two of the
agricultural Triad" if the third con-
stituent is not there the crop of beans
will testify to its absence by poor yield.
In short, beans require complete fertil-
izer, rich in nitrogen, the same as tobacco
and onions. As we have to plow and cul-
tvate equally for small as for large
crop, it is evidently wise to feed it we'll
enough to have a large one. In addition
to this we want good seed, such as nat
urally is disposed to "pod out J" well, and
of variety that is not too late Qike the
tree bean and the thousand-to.one y
to ripen its whole crop. We also want
variety popular in market, since the popu-
lar taste makes often difference of one
or two dollars bushel in the selling price
of the crop. 1t is advantageous to have
variety that is not only early, productive
and popular, but also one that ripens up
all its pods together. Such variety need
not be stacked, which is great saving in
labor and expense. When the leaves
have turned yellow the plants may be
pulled and reversed on the hill in conven-
lent punches, and left until pretty dry /;
then draw them in and store them, not
too deep, on pole scaffold, in well ven
tilated barn or shed, and wait for frosty
weather to thrash them. Another point
is to have kind that does not split too
easily under the fail. We have found all
these merits well combined in the I'm
proved Yellow Eye.