The progressive farmer. [volume] (Winston, N.C.) 1886-1904, 1902-07-22
Farm Miscellany.
HOW TO IMPROVE A WORKOUT FARM
AND MAKE MONEY ON IT.

- pAO0PN4O0o
County, Virginia, to the Commits
sioner of Agriculture of that State
viii be of interest to our readers as
showing what one farmer has done
towards retaining a WORKOUT farm:
"When you were in Chase City the
past summer I had the pleasure of
showing you over my farm, and L
briefly explained to you my system of
cultivation by which I reclaimed land
that was badly worn out and devas-
tated and brought up to its present
high state of fertility. You remark
ed that a history of my experience and
system of cultivation would, you felt
assured. be useful to farmers gener-
ally, and requested me to write an ar
ticle on the subject for your next re-
port.
"Tn complying with your request I
can only, in the limited space allotted
to me, allude in a general way to the
manner in which I accomplished the
end in view. The land was badly
quilted and overgrown with bushes,
with only here and there a few acres
that had been cultivated by negro ten
ants. In the first place, it became
necessary to fill up these gullies and
grub out the bushes, which took time,
money and hard, persistent labor in
order to prepare the land for cultiva-
ton.
"The soil was a chocolate loan,
with hard pan sub-soil, and had never,
perhaps, been plowed deeper than
three of four inches. I determined
to try the effect of deep blowing, but
met with a difficulty in the first place
in getting the right kind of a pillow
to do the work properly, as this was
away back in the early seventies, and
but little was known at that time of
chilled plows. After rejecting a num-
Der of plows that failed to go deep
enough, / finally got n of the best
improved three-horse chilled plows
and at once began a system of deep
blowing, disregarding the advice of
some of my neighbors who said I
would ruin the land by turning up so
much of the sub-soil. I did not find
it so, however, but, on the contrary,
it proved beneficial beyond my most
sanguine expectations, and l have pur-
sued the same system of deep blowing
for twenty-five years with the result
that my crops seldom suffer from
drought. I have found sub-soil plow-
ing very beneficial and usually follow
my turning pillow with the sub-soil
pillow, going to a depth of sixteen
inches, if possible.
Following this system of deep
blowing with the turning under of
clover and other green crops to add
humus to the soil, together with the
application of bone meal and potash,
soon brought gratifying results in the
way of largely increased crops.
"My first efforts in the cultivation
of corn and tobacco was in the direc-
ton of the extensive system, that is,
I planted a much larger area of my
land in these crops than I could cul-
tivate thoroughly, and such bad re-
suits followed that I discontinued the
practice and reduced the area neadly
one-half, and under the intensive sys-
tenn that I then pursued the result was
much more satisfactory.
"Now, as to my system of cultivat-
ing my corn crop. I fallow my land
during the fall and winter, if the
weather permits, blowing ten to twelve
inches in depth if I do not sub-soil,
or six inches if I use the sub-sol pillow.
As early in the spring as practicable
I 60 over my land several times with
the disc and spring-tooth harrows,
using the roller if it is cloddy, and
then narrowing it again until it is in
a fine, mellow condition, and at the
proper season for planting-which,
with me, is when the ground is get
ting warm-I lay it off both Ways in
rows three and one-half feet apart,
and drop the corn by hand, in the
check. When this corn is three to
four inches above ground, I use Malta
dOuble-shovel plows, with narrow couI-
ter on the foot next to the corn, and
run the plows as deep as they will go.
After going over the corn once each
way 1 lay aside the shovel plows and
use spring-tooth c~ultivators set so as
not to go a greater depth than three
inches. With these -cnltiratnrs I 90