The Opelousas courier., 1896-05-02
FARMER AND PLANTER
THE NEED OF THE HOUR

Keep Down the AcreaRe-1he Question
of Fertilization and Fertilizers.
The fertilizer men are making extern
Give preparations for the season, ano
the prospect is that the cotton farmer.
OF the south are about to commit the
extreme folly Of planting a larger ares
In cotton the coming season. The ro'
cent improvement in price, due to the
shot crop of last year, it is feared by the
best friends of the southern plant ter,
will have the effect of inducing the
farmers to plant an extensive area in
she staple, and to abandon the diversi-
d~cation of crops, which the low prices
Of the past have forced them to adopt:
With a favorable season, the result
will inevitably be low prices again.
What every friend of the south should
urge now is to keep down the acreage,
and to get the farmers to farm so as to
grow iIicre cotton per acre. Ten mil
lion bales on as lnany acres will leave
more profit at a low price, than TO-.
100000 bales on SO, OOG, 600 acres. The
man who takes three acres to grow d
bale, will feel the burden of fve-cent
cotton worse than the man who grows
a bale per acre. Good farming, with
cotton as the money crop, is what we
need in the cotton belt.
/ know m man here in North Caro-
lima. who has a little farm of SO acres,
which he farms ON a well=considered
Rotation. He plants bit six acres III
cotton, and any more. But
he never fails to get nine bales,
With ive-cent cotton this man is
whole, at least, but if he got
but two bales; as many of the larger
planters about him do, on the same
area, he would lose money when cot
ton goes down. But he does not get a
bale and a half per acre on land that
has been left out the year before to
rest by growing a crop of weeds, for
his land is in peas when not at work
growing a crop for sale, and the peas
furnish him the nitrogen which his
neighbors are buying at the rate of 16
to Is cents per pound. He encourages
the growth of the peas with the
cheaper forms of fertilizers in kainit
and acid phosphate, and the peas do
the rest. The peas are cut and fed,
and the manure returned to the soil.
And this Is the point which 1
have for years insisted Upon, that the
true policy is to feed literally the
crop that is going to enrich the land
and prepare it for the sale crop. We
know the peculiar value of potash in
the form of kainit OH the cotton crop
in preventing the rust, but it is not so
well known that the effects of kainit
are far better when applied some time
before the planting of the crop, SO
that the potash gets perfectly assimi-
lated in the soil and the surplus of
chlorine disappears. This is the rea-
son why the application of kainit and
acid phosphate to the preceding crop
of peas or clover will give better re-
suits on the cotton crop, than if APP
piled directly to the crop.
Last year a gentleman in South Car
DINA took my advice in this respect,
and fortified crimson clover the fall
before with kainit and acid phosphate,
cut a good crop of clover hay the next
spring. and at once planted the land in
cotton. He made double the crop on
that field that he got on an adjoining
field not SO treated, and then also
sowed clover among IT, cotton, and re-
Gently wrote me that ne has a fine
green clover field in place Of the usual
bare ground and dead stalks. But
some will say: Eyes, probably this is
what we should have done, but we did
not. Now what is the best thing for
us to do?" Well, our opinion is,
that the true policy is to get to farm
ing in this busincss-llke way as soon
as you can, and for the present select
a limited area of your best land and
and manure it more literally,
and try to get = big crop on fewer
acres.
AS a rule, l do Eot advise the use of
liainit as a source of potash, at least
at a distance from the seabord, be-
cause the freight runs up the price of
the actual potash to a higher price
than in the more concentrated forms
of muriate and su.phate. But for the
cotton crop, the potash in the form of
kainit has a greater value than in any
other form, from its capacity to pre-
vent rust. If you did not get the
kainit on a crop of peas or clover last
year, the next best way to get
its full effect is to put it in the fur
rows some time before the planting of
the cotton. If you mix your own fer
t~ilizers, as you should do, this will be
easy, for you can sow the kainit and
acid phosphate early, and apply the
seed, or the cotton seed meal,
that you may wish as the source of
nitrogen afterwards, just before, or at
planting time. But it will be a great
deal better to sow the kainit and bed
it some time before planting time.
will give far better results than if
applied at planting.
There is another ase for the kainit
that few of our farmers practice. 1t
well known that stable manure
loses value in nitrogen by
being piled and heated, the
of ammonia escaping
and the manure fre-fanging.
1t has long been a practice to scatter
among the manure to prevent
this, and this is a good practice. But
the cotton planter, who wishes to
increase the value of his manure bv
potash to it, anG a; tic s..,.,o ,
prevent the burning of the
as well or better than plaster
does, kainit comes in as a very useful
material. Kainit scattered freely |
among the manure as it is thrown out
the stables will not only prevent
,oss of ammonia, and add potash to
the manure, but it will put the pot
ash there in better shape for the
,rop of cotton than if it was
annliad To the cron diroa4 pr;4l