The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1886-10-14
PRACTICAL SUGGESTIONS.
~. L. Jones in Southern c,.llirasor for October

PRACTICAL SUGGESTIONS.
". L. Jones in Southern Cttltirator for October.
The gathering and housing of Summer
crops will for the present occupy most OF
the farmers time. The rewards of skill
and labor are now his. He not only has
the pleasure of seeing his barns and
store.houses we'll filled, but also the ex.
quisite enjoyment of plans consummated,
of undertakings we'll executed. His es-
innate Of his own ability is possibly
enhanced by the success of his ventures,
and he may reasonably and properly
indulge his pride little. For six months
or more he has been engaged in an ardu.
GUS campaign-one calling for unceasing
attention, unhagging energy and discrim-
mating judgment at every turn-one in
which difficulties were constantly to be
met and overcome-many Scylla on
the one side and Charybdis on the
other to be shunned-one in which CO.
operation with nature was 80 assiduously
courted and antagonism with her as care.
fully avoided. Now the bent bow may
be a little relaxed, and elasticity restored
to the strained body and mind.
While the plain, routine work of pick
ing cotton. or breaking corn is going on,
there is no strain upon the mind, and it
can leisurely and quietly look back and
compare results with their causes. Like
the old soldier who recalls the battles he
fought. the farmer can now bring back
before him the "tight places" he was in,
the difficulties he had to meet, and how
he met them, and calmly and judicially
discuss his management, whether good or
bad. If you had to do it over again, are
there any changes you would make {?
Would you have broken your land deeper
and more thoroughly? Would you have
narrowed it more before planting !?
Would you have used the same quantity
and kind of manure? Would you have
worked your crops more rapidly and
oftener in Spring and early Summer, and
gotten ahead of the grass before the rains
set iu7 If you had known it was going
to be wet Summer, would you not have
bestirred yourself little more2 Gould
you not have bestirred yourself without
knowing it was going to be wet2 Is it
not an excellent rule to be always pre-.
pared for the worst, though hoping for
the best3 Don't you think now, in view
of your extended cotton fields, with their
clean, bare surfaces ready to be washed
away, and their soils leached by the
Winter rains, that you planted rather too
much cotton? Would it not have been
better to have rested some of the land
you cultivated? 1t is quite remarkable
that in country in which population is
so sparse, and land is so superabundant,
we are as anxious to utilize every foot of
it every year, as in countries where pop
ulation is very dense and the land can
hardly slpport,it. Ourjudgment is that
if half the open land in the country was
rested every year (absolute rest, not sown
in grain} as much would be made on the
half cultivated, as is now made on the
/" 1 Have the arrangements, you adopted
last Winter land Spring, to,prevent the
washing Of. your land proved successful ?
Didn't you, make your terraces in the
early Spring, just before the usual big
rainfalk occur, and did not these rains
strike them before they had time to get
mpacted or get q growth of any kind
upon themto bind and hold them, and
did not they get badly washed away?
Would it not be better to make terraces
on land when it is resting OF in stubble,
and do the work in the Fall or early
Winter; so that the terraces may get
settled and firm before the heavy Spring
rains; :. and would. it not be we'll TO, SOW
the terracesin rye or wheat, as soon as
they or made,s and get a growth upon
them at once? If terraces freshly made
in stubble land should give way under
heavy rain, the land would not wash, be.
cause it is compact and held by roots.
But when terraces are made in Spring,
and the land between them plougbed, as
is generally the case, the washing. be-
comes excessive and disastrous if heavy
rains prevail We have found That on
old land, in which washes have already
started, it is extremely difficult to get
terraces we'll established without the aid
of some hillside bitches. Our practice
in such cases, is to run ditchesj just as one
would do if be did not have terracing in
view, and then lay off terraces just as if
there were no bitches present-of course
jumping over and not filling the bitches
where the terraces cross them. After the
terraces become we'll established and botb
incipient and old gullies are entirely
filled up, the bitches may be filled up if
one thinks he can control the water with
out them. On very rolling land, where
the disposition to wash is very great, we
find it best sometimes to run short secon.
dary bitches between the regular bitches.
A secondary ditch will run across from
one ditch to the next below, starting just
below the dam of the first and emptying
into the one below. Placed just above
an incipieut wash small secondary ditch
will assist materially in stoppingit. We
cannot join the ardent advocates of
terracing in wholesale denunciations of
hillside bitches. We find the latter, at
times, very useful-nay, almost indis'
pensable. If one starts with fresh land,
and there is no uncultivated slope above,
from which water may flow down upon
it, terraces alone may answer, but on old
lands where washes have already started,
these may be arrested and permanently
stopped by judicious combination of
bitches and terraces with more ease and
more quickly than by terraces alone.
Terraces are sometimes made too narrow
a strip, at least two feet wide, in the mid:
die of them should not be disturbed by
the plow, but left firm and compact to
resist the washing action of water. After
the terrace is we'll established it may be
reduced in width if deemed advisable.
Can good part of the leisure time
between this and Spring be better spent
than in devising ways and putting into
execution means to prevent the washing
away of our soils? All admit this is the
very foundation of successful farming,
and yet we go on from year to year pur.
suing methods which facilitate the wash.
ing away of the soil and hardly ever
stopping and taking time to arrest it.
What is done in this direction, is most
frequently done in hurried and ,imper-
feet manner in the Spring, when heavy
rainfalls startle US from our lethargy by
their destructiveness.
In sections where grains and grasses
constitute the prevailing crops, these
difficulties do not confront farmers. We
scarcely ever see an allusion to the wash
n,u,or &c so;le II; Northarn or Weutern