The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1893-05-15
Irish Potatoes-The Fall or Second
Crop.

crop, it is well to begin the preparation of
the land for it, says the Southern Planter.
This preparation should be the growth of
some fodder crop, say peas preferably, on
| deeply plOwed and well worked seed
! bed, into which has been completely
mixed good dressing of barn yard
manure well rotted, or in its absence or
even with it if the land be poor, a
dressing of 600 pounds of phosphate
either in the form of bone or acid phOs
phate) and a like quantity of kainit per
acre. This will secure a heavy crop of
peas, which can either be cut for green
feeding during June and July, or be made
into hay in the latter month in time to
leave the ground ready and fitted for the
potato sets. In our next we will say
something as to the proper course to be
taken with the sets which should be
saved from the spring grown crop and the
planting of them. Meanwhile we would
invite the attention of our readers to
what that well-known southern farmer,
Jeff Welborn, says of his experience with
Irish potatoes, both spring and fall grown
ones. We are entirely in accord with
him on this subject.
l. IfevGry farmer would grow full crop
for winter use at home, which would save
cash for other supplies the Irish potatoes
would be second only to the cotton crop
for cash to meet mortgages and would to
a great extent take the place of both -four
and meat and save some doctors bills.
Yes, - some wiz say, but we cannot
save the spring crop over summer in
edible condition. and the fall crop is both
expensive and uncertain" From eight
crops in four years without change Of
seed, and various experiments, claim the
spring crop can be perfectly carried
through the summer, and that the fall
crop need not interfere with other
crops or cost half as much as
the spring crop land no CASH; be
equally certain and produce twice as
many marketable potatoes, both for the
table and spring planting, superior TO any
northern potato. The fall potato crop is
! as superior to the spring crop as the fall
crop of turnips is superior to spring
grown. No northern or spring-crop potato
can sell in competition with the southern
fall crop, any more than fruit and vege-
tables of low, wet climates can compete
with the dry climate fruit and vegetables
of California and Colorado The spring
crop imbibes excess of water instead of
starch and sugar, as in dry climates Nor
fall-grown vegetables.
Then again. if the regular Tennessee
fall potato, the Triumph, is planted, it
will be growing when the frost or cold
suddenly cuts of the growth. 1t does not
bloom early like nOthern potatoes |
have graveled out potatoes that would
weigh pound before any bloom could be
seen. This causes them to hold the same
tender favor of rapid-growing young
tubers, which no spring-grown potato
contains The fall growing improves
them both in quality and earliness for
spring planting. They will be ready for
the table before the earliest and most
northern grown planted in the spring
There are two features necessary to be
observed: First, the fall crop must not
be planted on the land on which the
spring crop has been grown.
Second, the preparation of Land for fall
crop must begin in the spring. The land
must be thoroughly fined so as to hold
moisture. Any but most thoroughly de-
composed manurCs would cause the land
to dry out if plOwed under; so would
phosphate and potash. But it is not
necessary to cultivate the land without
spring CROP on the other hand, any crop
that will shade the land and be ready to
be taken off the land by the first of
August, if thoroughly cultivated, will
leave the land in better condition than if
no crop had been grown.
The crops | use are Spanish COOLERS and
peas, and all vines are removed and land
plowed and thoroughly narrowed as soon
as the shade is removed. No other fer
tilizer or manure is used. On land that
would make 900 pounds of seed cotton
per acre we made at the rate ofA60
bushels of marketable potatoes worth
this spring 50 20 per busheD per acre at
home.
The actual cost of labor was not 10
cents a bushel. l can make twice as
much forage from Spanish COOLERS as 1
can from corn, and four or five times as
much cash from the fall crop of Irish po-
tatoes as from cot ton on the same land,
and both crODs will not cost as much as
the one cotton crop to make and pick.