IMPROVEMENTS IN TREATING AND PREPARING POTATOES FOR SEED
Year: 1850

page_text: TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, GEORGE
MICHIELS, of Leicester Square, in the County of Middlesex, Engineer, send
greeting:
WHEREAS Her present most Gracious Majesty did, by Letters Patent
under the Great Seal of Great Britain, dated the Seventeenth of October last,
give and grant to me, my exors, adñiors, and assigns, for a term of fourteen
years, especial licence, full power, and sole authority, to make, use, exercise,
and vend; an Invention communicated to me by a Foreigner residing, abroad,
of "IMPROVEMENTS IN TREATING AND PREPARING POTATOES FOR SEED," provided
that I should duly enrol a true and correct Specification of the said Invention
within six months after the date of the said Letters Patent.
NOW KNOW YE, that I, the said George Michiels, do describe the said
Invention as follows, that is to say:-
The Improvements in Treating and Preparing Potatoes for Seed consist,-,
First, in the method by which the germs or eyes from potatoes are ex-
tracted, rendering the remaining flesh thereof available for food or other useful
purposes, as contrasted with the present mode of burying such flesh with the
germs or eyes when sown, and in the new instrument by which this method is
carried out and performed.
Second, in the application of charcoal to the germs or eyes when extracted,
by which they are so prepared that they will keep fresh and sound for several
months.
I proceed to describe the instrument, and the mode of treating the potato
with it, and also the process of applying the charcoal powder:
Figure 1 is an outside view of the instrument; Figure 2 a longitudinal
section of it. This instrument may be construeted of metal, glass, or

page_text: other suitable material, and may be cast or manufactured with tools.
A, the round point of the instrument, should be four tenths of an inch in
diameter, and is, when the instrument is in use treating the potato for
seed, placed over the germ or eye to be extracted. The seats of germs or eyes
are well known to the grower of potatoes by indications on the exterior of the
tuber. B is the pipe or top part of the instrument, about seven tenths of an
inch in length, and is to be constructed of that length, in order, that it may,
when pressed into the potato, reach to, or near to, the base of the germ. C is
an exterior rim, which should not exceed two tenths of an inch in width, and
which serves the important purpose to the manipulator of unerringly arresting
the progress of the instrument into the potato instantly that it has reached the
proper depth, viz., the base of the germ.. D-is the handle of the instrument,
which should be about four inches in length. It is shaped as an inverted
hollow cone, for the purpose of allowing the extracted germs to fall out easily
from the pipe downwards through the handle. When the operator holding
the handle has placed the top or point A over the outward indication or
appearance of the germ on the potato, the instrument is pressed in a direct
line into the potato until the rim C'arrests its further progress. A slight jerk
now given by the motion of the wrist will cause the bottom or base of 'the germ
to snap off, and, upon drawing out the extractor from the potato, the germ will
stick in the pipe and falls out at the larger end of the cone. Immediately that
one germ has been thus extracted the operator places the point A over the
second germ, and pursues the like process to extract it, and so on; as many
germs may be extracted as are desired. The advantage of treating the potato
thus is, that all the flesh is saved for consumption or use after the germs are
taken out, and the germs are obtained always whole and perfect, and uninjured
and unbroken, and in a fit state to be easily preserved in charcoal. powder, as
next described, and from the moisture on their surface when extracted the
powder adheres, and forms a preserving film around each germ. I have
described the instrument as having its upper pipe round or circular, but
this pipe may be octagonal or of other shapes. It is more' convenient to the
operator that it should be circular.
The mode of applying the powder is simple the charcoal should be of a
good description, and I recommend it to be made from the wood of the poplar
tree, and to be ground to a fine impalpable powder. The germs, as ex-
'tracted, should be placed in a barrel or box, and sprinkled with the powder,
or shaken about in a barrel or box containing powder, until each germ
gets a coating upon it. The moisture of the germ, as I have stated, will
cause the powder to adhere. When the box or barrel is filled to the extent
desired a layer of powder should be spread at the top, and the lid or cover

page_text: be put on, and in this state the germs can be stored out of the influence of
the frost until the season arrives for planting. Upon extensive potato farms
beds of the powder may be made of great size to hold many thousand germs,
and be then covered with straw or matting. Four, five, or more germs
may be placed in each dibble hole when planting, according to the judgment
and experience of the grower. The advantages derived from these germs
being light in weight, easily transported from county to county, or shipped from
country to country, and preserved fit for seed months after being extracted, are
all obvious and self evident.
Having now described the nature of the Invention, and the method of
carrying the same into effect, I desire to state that I do not claim the mere
scooping or cutting out of germs or eyes as a novelty. But I claim as new, in
the treatment of potatoes for seed, the extraction of the germs or eyes, sur-
rounded by a uniform and very small quantity of potato flesh, by means of an
instrument, as herein-before described, shaped or regulated to pass into the
potato to the base of the germs or eyes, and no farther, and to extract the same
germs whole and perfect, and uninjured in every case, with the minimum of
potato flesh surrounding them. And I also claim as new the said instrument
for treatment of the potato, as herein-before described, especially in its distin-
guishing formation of the outer rim C, to regulate and fix the depth to which
it is to be pressed into the potato.
And I further claim as new the application of charcoal powder to germs
or eyes, when extracted, in order to prepare the same for preservation as seed.
In witness whereof, I, the said George Michiels, have hereunto set my
hand and seal, this Seventeenth day of April, One thousand eight
hundead and f