198

SB 211
.P8 U6
1917

Copy 1

U5. UR PARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE,

BUREAU OF PLANT INDUSTRY.
WM. A. TAYLOR, Chief.

ECONOMICAL METHODS OF CUTTING SEED POTATOES.
U normal conditions, the cost of seed for planting a unit

area of potatoes is high in comparison with the cost of seed

for a like area of most other staple annual crops. This year,
because of the scarcity of seed potatoes, the price is unusually high.
It is therefore desirable to prepare the tubers used for seed in such a
way as to plant the greatest possible area consistent with satisfactory
crop yields.

Experience has demonstrated that a seed piece weighing from 14
to 2 ounces approaches the ideal for use in the humid areas of the
United States adapted to potato culture, and that such seed pieces
prepared by cutting a 4-ounce tuber into ales, as shown in figure 1,
B’, are most desirable. The fact that smaller peed pieces, somteinins
one or at most two eyes, give satisfactory yields should be sufficient
incentive, on account of the scarcity and high cost of good seed, so to
prepare such seed that it will plant a maximum acreage. Good seed
cut so that there is one or, at most, two good eyes on a seed piece
approximating 1 ounce in weight planted 12 inches apart in rows 30
or 36 inches apart will give a satisfactory stand and use the minimum
quantity of seed considered advisable.

Figures 2 and 3 illustrate tubers of different form and size so cut as
to carry at least one eye upon each seed piece and yet maintain a seed
piece of a size sufficient to supply the developing plant with enough
reserve food to give it a vigorous start. Contrary to what might be
supposed, the lace tuber shown ; in figure 3, which weighs 8 ounces,
is capable of being cut into 11 suitable seed pieces each with one or
more good eyes, while the 5-ounce tuber shown in figure 2 could only
be cut into 6 Emetacteny seed pieces. The larger tuber was in this
case the more economical for seed purposes. “Tt must be remem-
bered that these two tubers are very different in shape and represent
different types of the same variety. It is not, therefore, just to
conclude that the large tuber will, for all sorts, prove to be the most
economical for seed; this would be par ticularly true of varieties such
as Rural New Yorker No. 2 and Sir Walter Raleigh. In general, it is
believed that the 4 to 6 ounce potato will furnish the maximum
number of single-eye pieces per bushel of seed stock.

This season all tubers of 2-ounce weight should be cut into halves,
all 34 to 4 ounce tubers should be quartered, and all larger seed tubers
should be cut to single-eye pieces. With the pieces planted one in a
place in well-prepared soil, and with good cultivation, the resulting
crop will justify the care suggested in the preparation of the seed.

99347°—17

2

Fic. 1.—A and B, 4-ounce Irish Cobbler seed potatoes: A’, the 4-ounce seed potato shown at A, quar-
tered; B’, the 4-ounce seed potato shown at B, halved. ; i
Planted in rows 36 inches apart and with the pieces 12 inches apart in the row, it would require
approximately 14,520 pieces to plant an acre. If the 4-ounce tubers are quartered, as shown at A’, it
will require approximately 3,630 potatoes (9074 pounds, or 154 bushels of seed) to plant an acre. If the
tubers are cut into halves only, as shown at B’, it will require twice the quantity of seed mentioned
above, or about 30} bushels. If the seed pieces are 12 inches apart in rows only 30 inches apart it will
require about 17,424 pieces to plant an acre,

D. af D.
JUN 12 1917

Fic. 2—A, a 5-ounce Green Mountain seed potato; B, first step in cutting such a potato into seed pieces;

C, the process of cutting completed. _ j : d ;
Planted in rows 36 inches apart with the pieces 12 inches apart in the row, it would require about

2,420 five-ounce potatoes cut into six pieces, approximately 751 pounds, or 123 bushels of seed, to plant
an acre.

LIORARY UF CONGRESS

000 931 106 3

Fig, 3.—A, an 8-ounce Green Mountain seed potato; B, first step in cutting such a potato into seed pieces;
C, the process of cutting completed.
Six of the eleven seed pieces into which the tuber was cut have only one eye; the remaining five have
two or more. Planted in rows 36 inches apart and 12 inches apart in the row, it would require about
1,320 potatoes like the one shown at A to plant 1 acre—approximately 660 pounds, or 11 bushels,

O

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Hollinger Corp.
pH 8.5