The progressive farmer. [volume] (Winston, N.C.) 1886-1904, 1886-02-10

! Tic 1otH OI DoCemDof ana the IoCn OF
March, the earlier the better, and allot-
lottlng 100 square yards of seed-bed to
every 10000 plants that will be needed.
The ground selected for the purpose
should be virgin soil, of sandy texture,
rich and moist, with full exposure to the
sun, but sheltered to the north and west
against the cold winds of early spring.
Such spots can be readily found in
wooded hollows, at the foot of hills, and
near to or alongside some water course.
OthSr things being equal, the farther
into the, woods the spot selected is the
best in order to escape the bug.
The ground having been well chosen,
the next thing is to rake it cleanly, and
then burn it thoroughly so as to kill all
| germs of vegetation. The burning can
| be at a single blast, if done with dry
brush, heaped upon the entire bed a
height of some four feet. \ better but
| costlier method is to burn with wood
! purpose of ventilation, in which case the
wood should be piled the whole length
| of the bed, and of convenient width,
say six feet, and after the pile has been
well kindled, it should be allowed to
burn some two hours, or until the poles
underneath are. burned up. The burn
ing wood and fire Goals should now be
moved by using old hoes fastened upon
long handles, and again spread conve-
nient width and fresh wood added,
which should burn until the ground un-
derneath has been burnt as thoroughly
as before, and so ON until the entire bed
! has been burned over. As soon as the
! ground has cooled enough to walk upon
it, and without removing the ashes, it
should be broken deeply and finely with
| the mattock, care being taken not to in
vert the soil, and then chopped with
! wedding hoes and raked until clean of
roots and we'll pulverized--tor which re a
son land should never be burned when
| too wet.
! The quantity sown should be one
and a-half teaspoonfuls to every 100
square yards, and in that exact proper
ton for each fraction or multiple thereof.
Great care should be taken to SOW the
seed as regularly as possible, SO to pre-
vent some spots from being too thin, and
what is Wsf'se, other spots from being too
thick. ITO do so the seed should be care
fully measured and then thoroughly
mixed inn a convenient quantity of dry
ashes. and the mixture divided into two
equal parts. The bed should be marked
off into convenient sowing breadths by
lines four feet apart, and sOwed entirely
! over with one half the seed and in one
direction, and then over again with the
other half and in the opposite direction,
the sower retracing his steps. The seed
should be left upon the surface and
neither hoed nor raked into the soil, but
trodden in with the foot, or pressed in
with the back of a wedding hoe, or bet
ter still, by passing light roller over the
bed. To prevent drifting or pudding OF
the seed by washing rains, where the
ground is rolling, trenches slightly in
clined and two inches deep and four
feet apart should be made with the mat
took across the bed Where the ground
is fiat and subject to being sobbed, it
should be thoroughly drained, as nothing
browns more easily than tobacco plants.
For the three-fold purpose of warmth,
moisture and fertility, the bed should
now be top-dressed with covering half
inch thick of good stable manure broken
fine, the fresher the better, but in any
case free of grass seed. When such sta
BILE manure is not convenient, that from
the hen-house or pig-pen will answer,
hog hair also making an excellent top
dressing. If neither of these is at hand,
some strongly ammoniated fertilizer
should be applied at the rate of half
bushel of it to every 100 square yards,
and raked into the soil before seeding.
The bed should now be thickly covered
with fine brush to prevent both drying
and freezing of the soil, by which the
plants are either checked in the growth
or lifted out by the roots.
The next thing to be thought of is to
guard against the ravages of the tobacco
bug. an insect which by popular mis-
nomer is called ''The Fly which makes
its appearance about the first of April.
and for which when once it gets posses
sion of plantbed, no remedy has yet
been found. None of the insect poisons,
such as carbolic acid or kerosene oil, has
anv effect upon it. A partial preventive
| is to SOW the borders of the bed thickly
with black mustard. 1t springs up quick
ly, and upon it this bug loves to feed. A
still better preventive is to shut the bug
out bv fence around the he'd one foot
high, built of II inch plank nailed to
pegs driven into the ground, with little
earth pressed against the bottom of the
planks, SO AZ to make the fence bug
proof. Such Il fence or cold frame does
theadd itional good of keeping the bed