Keowee courier. [volume] (Pickens Court House, S.C.) 1849-current, 1917-07-25
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]. STORING SWEET POTATOES. i.
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Washington, July 24.-There is no
mystery about building satisfactory
storage house for sweet potatoes.
Southern farmers who are paying
large prices for patented plans and
equipment alleged to provide the only
successful way OF storing sweet no
tatoes are being defrGuded. Special
lists of the United States department
Of Agriculture, whose attention re-
Gently has been called to Instances in
which farmers have paid as high as
$3.50 for sets of plans, do not hesi-
tate to brand such activities as plain
humbuggery. Plans Of houses that
incorporate the simple priciples Of
storage and common-sense methods
Of construction, and which have
proved successful by years of careful
trial, are furnished free by the De-
partment Of Agriculture to any far
mer who will ask for them.
Because reports have been made
and circulated in the South that stor-
age houses recommended by the De-
partment of Agriculture are not sat
isfactory, it Is believed necessary,
now that the time to provide ade-
quate storage for the coming harvest
Is at hand, to correct such state
ments. One man with plans to sell
has said that the shrinkage Of sweet
potatoes stored in houses designed
by the government specialists is from
16 to 20 per cent, while in houses Of
his design there is practically no
shrinkage. The fallacy OF such a
claim, department specialists point
out, lies In the fact that shrinkage is
essential to good keeping Of the pota-
toes. Sweet potatoes stored in the
type Of house recommended by the
department shrink from 8 to 10 per
cent-in weight, not bulk-by reason
of evaporation Of surplus moisture.
Proper curing Of sweet potatoes
means getting rid Of surplus mois-
ture, and the type of house which the
specialists suggest accomplishes this
by combining the ordinary principles
Of good ventilation with common
sense methods of construction.
Storage houses built according to
plans suggested by the Department Of
Agriculture have been in use in every
State Of the South for five or six
years. The department has no knowl-
edge of failure in any house built
and operated strictly according to
recommendations Four years of in
vestgation, with one hundred houses
under observation, showed that the
average loss by decay, after an av-
erage storage period of 124 days, was
less than 2 NJ per cent. In determin-
ing this loss representatives Of the
department personally graded the po-
tatoes In each house-a total of 22S,-
600 bushels. Every potato that had
a decayed spot was thrown out and
classed as decayed. In each case the
potatoes were harvested, stored and
cared for by the farmers. In the de-
partment's own storage house at Ar
lington, Va, sweet potatoes stored in
October last year and removed the
latter part Of June showed a loss Of
less than l per cent.
Farmers intending to build a stor-
age house should write to the De-
partment of Agriculture for Farmers
Bulletin 548, Storing and Market
ing Sweet Potatoes" This bulletin
gives plans and lists Of materials
needed and also tells how to convert
buildings, such as abandoned tenant
houses, into storage quarters.
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