Rensselaer Union, Volume 3, Number 16, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 12 January 1871 — Potato Production. [ARTICLE]

Potato Production.

As an experiment in developing the productiveness of potatoes, a Rev. I)r. Wrenford, of Nairnshire, Scotland, last year planted twenty-six tubers, each by itself uncut, iu a pit dug three feet deep, but with a foot of intermixed manure and soil at the bottom, so that the actual depth was was about two feet. At the time of planting, only two inches of soil was put on tire tubers; and as the plant grew higher and higher, more was added until the pit was filled. The weight of the seed potatoes was about eleven pounds, and on digging the crop, the yield was found to weigh 312 lbs., and to number 627 tubers, or an average of about half a pound each. Only fifty-seven were small, weighing I}< ouriccs each, or less, while 205 weighed over a pound apiece, five of them going above two pounds. In addition to the pecuculiar method of planting, the leading stalk* were pegged down from time to time, and as a result of this, in one case, thirteen potatoes, weighing %% pounds, were dug within a circle around the collar of the plant, and about, 18 inches from the root Potatoes planted in the ordinary way guf sered much from the drrfuth, but in this experiment the depth at which the tubers were placed prevented their feeling the scarcity of moisture.

The yearly mortality of the globe is said to be 38,333,333 persons. This is at the rate of 91,554 per day, 373 per hour, and 42 per minute. One-fourth of the population die at or before the age of seven years ; one-half at or before seventeen years. Among 10,000 persons, one arrives at the age of one hundred years; one in 500 attains the age of ninety, and one lives to the age of sixty. Hoaxes Greeley’s Essays, “What I know of Farming,” which have been published in The Trxbane every week during 1870, are tb be printed in book form, and a copy will pe sent, post-paid, to each subscriber who.sendsflO for The Daily, |4 for The SemiWeekly, or ?'J for The Weekly Tribune, and requests the book at the time of subscribing. This will enable old subscribers to secure the Essays for preservation, on renewing their subscriptions, mtd new subscribers wifi, of course, be glad to obtain them, free of cost.