Premiums having been proposed to encourage the raising of Carrots,
Rutga Baga and Mangel Wurtzel; and as these articles, cultivated
extensively, are of vast importance to farmers; I can perhaps in no
way better promote the views of the Society, in their vote before
mentioned, than by describing the methods of cultivating those
roots, which elsewhere have been practised with great success, but
to which, and indeed to the roots themselves (Carrots excepted) most
of our husbandmen are strangers.
The introduction of Clover, and subsequently carrying the culture of
the Common Turnip extensively into the field, marked distinguished
eras in the improvements of English Husbandry. At a later period,
Carrots were cultivated by some farmers: and within a few years
past, the Mangel Wurtzel and the Rutga Baga have become objects
of general cultivation. And now these five articles constitute
essential branches of the highly improved Husbandry of Great Britain.
COMMON TURNIPS. These for a long time were raised (and perhaps this
practice is still very general) by sowing the seeds broad-cast, and
weeding and thinning them with hoes, till the plants stood from a
foot to fifteen inches apart. But the most correct practice appears
to be that of drilling the seeds in rows, thinning them at the
distance of ten or twelve inches in the rows, and hoeing and keeping
them clear from weeds. And this weak, watery root has been the
principal food of immense flocks of store sheep, during the winter;
and when plentifully given, only with the addition of straw, has
served to fatten cattle and sheep for the market.
CARROTS, Even these plants, so long after they vegetate extremely
small, were also raised from seed sown broad-cast. But this awkward
practice, I believe, has generally given way to the row-culture,
whether the seeds were sown by hand, or by the instrument called a
drill. In very rich land, great crops have been raised where the
rows were only from twelve to fifteen inches apart. The great crop
of 752 bushels, weighing eighteen tons and three quarters raised
on one acre, in Salem, by Erastus Ware, in 1817, was in rows about
sixteen inches apart. The seed was sown the 14th of May. But I am
inclined to think a preferable mode would be, to sow the seeds in
double rows about ten inches apart, with intervals of three feet
between the rows, so as to admit a small plough, as well as the
hoe, in their cultivation. In this case, a deep furrow being opened
by the plough, the manure should be regularly thrown into it, and
covered by four back furrows, so forming a ridge over the manure;
and this ridge being laid level with a light harrow, or with rakes,
or if the soil be in fine tilth, by a light roller, will then be
ready to receive the seed. As soon as the Carrots are plainly to
be seen, they should be hoed and weeded; or the weeds will soon
outstrip the Carrots (which are of very slow growth at first) and
render their cleansing vastly more troublesome and laborious.--They
should also be thinned, to stand single, and only from three to five
inches apart in the rows; or the roots will be small, and cost much
more time in handling and topping (cutting or wringing off the tops)
at the time of harvesting them. The entire crop, too, will doubtless
be smaller than when the plants are thinned as here recommended.
THE MANGEL WURTZEL. This plant yields a much more abundant crop than
the Carrot; and at the same time contains, in the same quantity or
weight of roots, a great deal more nourishment; whence it is natural
to suppose that it requires a richer soil than Carrots. I have not
made sufficient trials to enable me to express a decided opinion on
the best mode of cultivating the Mangel Wurtzel; and will therefore
lay before you the successful practice, on strong land, in the
county of Essex, in England, as it is stated, from a recent English
publication, by the Philadelphia Society of Agriculture.[4]
[4] Memoirs of the Society, Vol. III. Appendix.
The Mangel Wurtzel is sometimes called the Great, or Improved Beet,
and Root of Scarcity; but now, more generally, Mangel Wurtzel, its
German name. The following is the account of its culture at Bedford,
in Essex.
"It may be proper, in the first place, to state what is meant by
_strong land_. The surface soil is loamy, and from four to twelve
inches deep, upon a bed of strong clay mixed with gravel. It is
too heavy, and generally too wet, in the winter, even for sheep to
eat a crop of turnips on the ground; and although good turnips are
raised upon it, it is always necessary to draw them for the sheep,
stall-fed cattle, or cattle in the yards."
"In the middle, or latter end of the month of April, the furrows are
set out with the plough, two feet apart, and double ploughed; that
is, the plough returns on the [same] furrow to the point whence it
set out, forming a ridge between each two furrows."
"Double ploughing with a common plough is preferable to single
ploughing with a double mould board plough, because it affords a
greater depth of loose earth than the double mould board plough
would produce."
"In these furrows, the manure, which should be in a rotten state, is
deposited, after the rate of six cubic yards to an acre."[5]
[5] Six cubic yards contain 162 cubic feet, or three cart loads for
a pair of oxen. A cart body, 7 feet long, 4 feet wide, and 2 feet
high, _in the clear_, contains 56 cubic feet; and three times 56 are
168.--I doubt the necessity of manure being "in a rotten state,"
seeing it is to be so deeply buried, for this or any other root crop
intended for the food of domestic animals; especially for Mangel
Wurtzel, which to obtain a full crop, should be sown very early,
as soon as the ground is dry enough to be ploughed. The powerful
fermentation of fresh dung might impart to the soil a salutary
warmth in the cool spring season--At least it may be worth while to
try it.
"The ridges are then split by the plough, going and returning the
same way as before mentioned; leaving the manure immediately under
the middle of the new ridges. A light roller is then passed along
the ridges,[6] in the middle of which the seed is dibbled, so that
the plants may receive all the benefit which can be derived from the
manure."[7]
[6] These narrow ridges, as formed by the plough, are sharp; by
passing a light roller over them, they are flattened to a breadth of
8 or 9 inches. The light roller, drawn by a horse, that walks in the
furrow between them, flattens two ridges at a time. Thus rolled, the
manure will be covered 8 or 9 inches deep.
[7] A dibble is a simple tool, which may be of different sizes and
forms, according to the uses it is intended to serve. If for setting
(in transplanting) cabbages or other like plants, it may be a round
stick about an inch and a quarter in diameter, shaved down at one
end (in a slope of 8 or 10 inches long) to a blunt point. An old
spade or shovel handle is well adapted to the purpose. If much used,
the slope may be advantageously covered smoothly with iron. But for
putting in _seeds_, the dibble may be in the form of the letter T.
To make one, take a piece of wood about 3 feet 4 inches long, and
about an inch and a quarter square. In one of the sides bore holes
in a line, and insert teeth at the proposed distance of the plants
in the row: if for Mangel Wurtzel, at 10, 11 or 12 inches apart; and
let the teeth be as long (projecting from the head place) as the
proposed depth at which the seeds are to be sown. On the opposite
side of the head-piece, bore a hole in the middle, large enough to
receive a handle of convenient length. On the top of the handle fix
a cross-piece 5 or 6 inches long, to be grasped by the hand in using
the tool.--With it, as many holes for seeds will be made, at every
movement, as there are teeth in the head. The handle may require
bracing, in like manner as a rake handle and its head is braced by
means of bows.
It now occurs to me, that perhaps the light roller used in levelling
the tops of the ridges may be set with teeth, and thus perform the
additional office of making holes for the seed; and with vastly
greater expedition than by dibbling. A light roller, long enough to
flatten two ridges at once, of 13 inches in diameter, and furnished
with two sets of four teeth each to pass along the middle of two
adjoining ridges--and the four teeth of each set being inserted at
equal distances in a circle of the roller,--the holes for the seed
would be made at the desired distance of near one foot from each
other. The teeth should be so shaped as to leave the holes made by
them fairly open. For this purpose they may be an inch and a half
wide and three quarters of an inch thick, where their shoulders are
fayed to the roller, and taper thence to a rounded thick edge at
their extremities. The same teeth, if not too long, may serve to
regulate and expedite the sowing of the Ruta Baga seed.
"The seed is deposited about an inch deep, whilst the moisture
is fresh in the earth,[8] and covered by drawing a garden rake
along the rows. After this, the light roller is again passed along
the ridges, [to press the earth upon the seeds] and the work is
finished."
[8] It is very important to have seeds of all kinds sown as soon as
possible after the ground is ploughed and prepared to receive them,
and before the moisture of the fresh-stirred earth is dissipated by
the sun and drying winds; otherwise some may never vegetate, or not
till after a fall of rain; and so precious time may be lost, and an
uneven crop be produced.
"When the plants are about the size of a radish, they are hoed with
a turnip hoe, leaving the plants in the row about twelve inches
apart. If any of the seeds fail, and there happen not to be an even
crop, the roots where they are too thick are drawn out before the
hoeing takes place, and transplanted to fill up the vacant places,
and ensure a full crop; which is always certain, inasmuch as 99
plants out of 100 thrive and do well. In transplanting, care is
necessary to prevent the point of the root from turning upwards."
"The weeds, while the plants are young, are kept hoed; but after the
head of the plant has once spread, no weed can live under its shade;
and the expense of hoeing afterwards is trifling indeed."
"The whole of the crop is taken up in the month of November,[9] in
dry weather. The tops are cut off near the _crown_ of the plants,
and the plants, when perfectly dry, are piled up in a shed, and
covered with straw sufficiently thick to preserve them from the
frost. They kept last year till the latter end of March, and they
would have kept much longer."
[9] The time of taking up the Mangel Wurtzel must be regulated
by the climate. There is sometimes a frost in the latter part of
October, in this county, severe enough to injure this root, exposed,
as the greater part of it is above ground. Light frosts, however,
will do it no harm, while the roots remain in the ground, and in a
degree sheltered by their leaves.
"Where a field selected for a crop of Beet [the Mangel Wurtzel]
happens to be in a foul state, the seed had better be sown in a
garden, and the whole field planted with the young Beet, when of
the size of a radish. This will give time for cleaning the ground,
and fitting it for a crop; for although the Beets are destroyers of
weeds, it is not meant to recommend sowing them on foul ground, or
in any way to encourage a slovenly system of farming."
"The method of cultivating the Beet root, here recommended, is the
same as that used in the cultivation of turnips, in Northumberland,
and other parts of the North of England with this exception, that
the rows there are 27 inches apart.--There may be reasons in the
North for still preserving that space; but in Essex the effect of
it, in the cultivation of the Beet root, would be, that instead
of 48 tons per acre, 43 tons only would be obtained. Experience
has proved, that the roots do not get to a larger size in rows
three feet apart, than they do in rows two feet apart. It may
therefore fairly be presumed, that they would not be larger, in rows
twenty-seven inches apart; and if not larger, the weight of the
crop, per acre, must be less, because the plants decrease in number
as the rows increase in space."
To the preceding account of cultivating the Mangel Wurtzel, I will
subjoin a few