The Somerset reporter., 1898-03-17

CUTTING SEED POTATOES.

Each Variety Has Its Own System of Eyes
and Should he Cut Accordingly.
Such excellent authority as Mr.. ]. J.
II. Gregory of Massachusetts expresses
in The American Cultivator his views
on cutting potatoes for seed. They are
to the following effect:
OF all knives tor cutting potatoes a
jackknife is the worst. To do good work
we want the thinnest of knives, while
that is about the thickest of all There
is nothing better than shoemaker s
knife, having blade fully six inches
long. With one of these on long job
one can do fully quarter more than
with a jaokknife and do it with far
greater ease. Continuous cutting of seed
for several acres is apt to give sore hands
unless they are now and then eased a
little. | find it very convenient to do
this by resting the potato on the edge OF
the barrel ard giving downward cut,
being careful that there is no nail be-
meath to dull the knife.
Each variety Of potato has its own
system of eyes, some, like the Ohio fam
lily, with but few, and most of these at
the seed end, and others, like the Rose
family, with a plenteous scattering Of
them about evenly all over the tuber.
To give, therefore, an equal share Of
eyes and at the same time an equal
share of the potato for them to feed on
when they first start, the Ohio class
need to be cut from the seed end down,
thus halving or quartering them, while
those of the Rose class should be cut
slanting across their length, beginning
at the stem end, with a slanting cut,
which shall give the stem end and two
eyes to the first piece; then turning it
around cut two more eyes and let the
last cut pass right up through the seed
end, giving half Of it to each Of the
pieces.
After we have got the hang Of the
variety we are cutting in the matter Of
the distribution of the eye, there is but
little need of counting them, for by cut
ting off the same proportion each time
we shall hit near enough for all praoti-
cal purposes.
This plan of cutting to two eyes WAS
inaugurated when the Early Rose and
other high priced varieties we're intro
duced, to economize in the use Of stock,
making about six Bushels plant an acre,
instead Of using q dozen or 10 bushels,
as by the old plan. 1t gives good crops
Of large sized potatoes, sometimes, how
ever, to the loss of the farmer, for, how
ever bountiful the crop raised under the
system, the teaching of several careful
experiments made at the agricultural
experimental stations is that while
whole large potatoes used as seed give
q larger proportion Of small ones than
do pieces with two eyes, yet pieces OF .
size intermediate between the two, OF
the size of half an ordinary potato, will
yield more marketable potatoes than
either, sometimes full quarter more.
The reason is supposed to be that the
larger pieces afford more nourishment
to the more vigorous shoots, and their
more vigorous roots enable them to as.
simulate larger proportion Of the plant
food as they push out from the mother
potato. The high cost Of seed that led
farmers into the practice Of light seed.
ing no longer exists, and In season
like this the planting Of larger seed
pieces would undoubtedly give hand
some return over the difference between
the first cost of the seed.