The county record. [volume] (Kingstree, S.C.) 1885-1975, 1905-01-26
urIn

owing.
Thirty years old in any one line
of business is quite patriarchlal,
for this has been generation OF
changes and frequent adjustments and
readjustments. 1t has not fallen to
the let Of many men to hold to one
thing for so near the third part Of the
century. consider myself fortunate
that fate has permitted me to bend
virtually all the energies of my life
to one thing. given me time and op-
portunity to master it in proportion to
my abilities and to reap a reward that
seems to me greater than my deserts.
And still more fortunate am l in that
have had sons to grow up around me,
profiting by my experience. TO see more
broadly and reach higher. making my
plans and aims their plans and aims,
but larger. But ! am not writing Il
family history, but 4 treatise on fruit
growing.
In that thirty years learned many
things and had to unlearn many things.
What had to chiefly unlearn was
that the old system Of manuring fruits
was wrong. TO Inc and to my average
contemporaries in those days manure
was manure and fertilizer fertilizer.
1t occurred to us dimly, if at all. that
rs different animals required different
kinds of food and in different proper
tions, so did different plants and crops.
And l will add that the loss from lily
balanced manure and fertilizer in those
dark days was enormous, and who will
be bold enough to say that tho dark
days ere even yet entirely past with
all Of us?
The three fcrtliZing properties which
experience has proven sho:,ld be added
to the soil to make it productive are,
as is well known, nitrogen, potash and
phosphoric acid. All Of these are es-
sential, one as much as the other, but
they are needed in different proper
tions on different soils and for different
crops. and their blind and injudicious
use works loss in many ways:
IS nitrogen is the most expensive
it is in that the greatest waste
and loss occurs in the ignorant
use CT fertilizers. The loss is greater
in berry fruit growing than in any
other crop we have. because more fer
tilizer is used on this than is the Gus
tom on other crops and because the
loss in quantity and quality through
unwise manuring is SO great i'll this
crop.
My largest crops OF fruit have A.
ways come from the most liberal Use
Of fertilizer when rightly proportioned.
Ny largest crops Of disappointments
have grown where the larSes. guam
.ity of lily balanced fertilizer was used.
My experience is that perfectly
balanced berry fruit fertilizer should
contain at least two and ona-half times
as much potash and twice rs much
phospnoric :cid as it contains am
Mon;a.
My plan in planting Strawberries.
dewberries. blackDarrics, raspberries.
etc, is to apply cottonsccI meal in the
Crills before the plants arc set at the
rate of COO to 500 pounds TO the acre.
This is sown in tic drills and mixed
with the soil and listed OIL just before
the plants are SET in winter or spring.
After that 10 moro nitrogen is used in
any form until after the crop is gath
cred tho following year.
1 depend upon plenty OF potash and
nilosrhoric acid to make The fruit. Nor
have I ever failed in my whole cX
rer.encc to make 4 good crop except
one year when hail destroyed about
cnc-haif. l apply potash i'll the form
Of suiph&te Of potash. which is decid-
caly the best form for al kinds Of
fruit. using about 100 pounds per acre,
usually mixed with 300 pounds Of
acid phosphate or dissolved bone. This
mixture l sow broadcast over the
plants during late fall and winter. 1t
will undoubtedly pay to use Il some
what large quantity OF both OF these
fertilizers either broadcast before the
plants are SET OF else by chopping in
around and between the plants during
tho summer or early fall. Potash and
phosphoric acid, rs they arc much less
liable to be washed out and lost than
ammonia is, can therefore be more lib
orally used without loss, rs most Of
the fertility Of this Kind remains in the
soil unit! taken up by the plants.
will add that the largest yield Of
strawberries which ever heard Of
being made in this State was grown
by myself under the system of fertil-
:zing above described.
@. ". BLACKNALL.
Eittrell; \. C..