Part 9

EXTRA EARLY DWARF ROUND PURPLE.--This variety is in every respect similar to the New York Purple, excepting in size and time of ripening; the fully developed fruit being about two inches in length and being ready for use a few weeks after planting out in the garden.

NEW YORK IMPROVED LARGE PURPLE.--This is the best and most popular variety. It is of large size, very handsome color and appearance, and the largest in diameter of any variety, yielding large slices for frying. The quality is of the finest.

HORSE RADISH.

This pungent root is a great favorite as a relish in the early spring, and is credited with tonic properties; at any rate it is a very pleasant appetizer at a season when we have been almost without fresh vegetables for several months. It can be raised in almost any soil, though preferring a moist situation, and is most at home where it is constantly moistened or occasionally overflowed by some stream. It is raised from pieces of root, three or four inches in length and from ¼ to ½ inch in diameter. These slips are made from the tails or rootlets cut off in trimming the roots for grating, they should be cut off square at the top and sloping at the bottom, that you may readily know which end goes up when you plant them. The slips should be kept in a box of moist earth, in a cool cellar, after they have been trimmed, until planting time. The slips can be planted with a long trowel; but the best and quickest way is to drive a spade, full depth, into the soil, flatways with the garden line, move it slightly back and forward, to widen the hole, and slip a piece of root down each side of the cut made by the spade, which will make them six or seven inches apart; the spade should then be driven in about one inch back of its previous position and the handle pressed forward, which will pack the dirt solidly against the planted roots, the tops of which should be placed about one inch under the surface. Where it is desired to increase the supply as fast as possible, and where the roots have been used at home, the crowns or tops, with an inch or so of root adhering, can be planted again, but they will not make long, smooth roots, like the slips, but will have a tendency to make several small roots.

HOPS.

At the end of one of the berry rows, or in some corner where they will be out of the way of the plow, there should be a few poles of hops. These are grown from pieces of root, and after being once planted will not need further attention except to be kept clear of weeds and grass, to be supplied with a good topdressing of manure in the fall, and suitable poles to climb upon. These poles should be good strong ones, at least 8 to 10 feet in height. About the last of August or first of September the vines should be cut off near the ground and the poles pulled up, so that the crop may be gathered. There is an old saying that “the September winds should never be allowed to blow on the hops.” The hops should be spread on sheets and placed in some cool, airy garret or loft, to dry. It will take five or six good poles to make a bushel of hops.

LETTUCE.

This is generally known as salad, which is a misnomer, as salad means anything that is served in a green state; it may be onions, tomatoes, cabbage, lettuce, or anything of that kind. By general usage the word salad has been appropriated to the lettuce, as the latter is the plant most frequently grown in this country for salad. But call it whichever you like, it is one of the greatest additions to our tables, and in our kitchen garden it should not be made a side issue of a week or two in the spring, but should be raised in the finest condition possible throughout the season, and by using the hotbeds and cold frames it is possible to have it the whole year round.

To raise head lettuce in perfection the greatest care must be taken to reserve the very best and tightest heads for seed, or if the seed is to be purchased select the hardest-heading varieties. For the earliest planting the seed should be sown in the hotbed and have the same treatment as its associate, the cabbage; the young plants should not be allowed to stand too thickly; they should be at least an inch apart in the seed bed, or be transplanted to that distance when half an inch high. When the cabbage is set out, one or two lettuce plants may be set between each pair of cabbages in the row, according to the distance the cabbages are apart. There must be space enough between the plants to give the soil a good stirring with the hoe around each plant, as thorough cultivation is essential to the best development of both cabbage and lettuce. A second lot of seed should be planted when the tomatoes and egg plants are sown; these can be set out in the garden as soon as they are large enough to handle. The third sowing should be made in the open garden when the first planting is done, and the young seedlings should be transplanted as soon as the plants are large enough and before they begin to be crowded in the row, as this last sowing will not form heads without it receives the best of care. These three sowings are about all that can be depended upon to make hard heads, unless it can be planted in some rich, shady corner, and carefully nursed with the watering pot.

About the first or middle of May a sowing should be made of the “Perpetual Lettuce,” and the plants, when large enough, should be transplanted and treated the same as the head lettuce; it will not form tight heads, but produces a fine bunch of broad, yellowish-green leaves, which are very crisp and delicate, not being strong and bitter, as most lettuces are in hot weather. This lettuce will stand from four to six weeks without running to seed, so that if plantings are made about once a month it can be had in perfection throughout the balance of the season. If the head lettuce is more particularly desired, a sowing should be made about the first of August, and another about the fifteenth; the young plants should be transplanted and treated in the same manner for heading as is followed in the spring; the first sowing will not produce heads unless the latter part of August and the first part of September be cool and moist; but you are almost sure to have fine heads from the second sowing. Personally, I prefer the Perpetual, both for its fine qualities and the ease of growing it.

Another way, and the easiest, to have a constant succession of lettuce for the table throughout the season, is to sow the seed thickly in drills and to cut the loose leaves close to the ground when it is three or four inches high; this produces rather narrow leaves, which are very tender and juicy, but which have not the substance of those grown as separate plants or heads, and are not so easily prepared for the table. These sowings can be made every few weeks, and a constant succession of young leaves be had for use throughout the entire season. It should be the object in sowing lettuce to plant small lots frequently, that it may always be had in the best condition.

About the second week in September a sowing of some early hard-heading variety should be made, and a succeeding one about the first of October; from these two sowings the cold frames should be planted, about one-third from the first and two-thirds from the second; the plants should be set about six inches apart each way, which will allow about fifty plants to each sash. When cold weather comes the sash should be put on, and the outsides of the frames banked around with long stable manure. The plants must be treated to plenty of fresh air whenever the weather will permit of it, and on very cold nights the sash should be reinforced with a covering of straw, old mats, or carpet. The lettuce grown in these frames is apt to be infested with the small insect known as the “Green Fly;” to prevent or to get rid of the presence of this pest, tobacco refuse and sweepings from a cigar-maker’s shop should be strewn on the soil under the leaves; this will destroy the fly and act as a fertilizer, but if too much is applied it will spoil the delicate flavor of the lettuce.

If a few very early cabbages are desired, the seed should be sown about the first of October and transplanted with the lettuce into the cold frames; planting them about two inches apart each way; if these are in good condition and the spring favorable, they can be planted out about the 15th of March, and will produce heads one to two weeks earlier than those raised in the hotbeds.

VARIETIES OF LETTUCE.

BURPEE’S HARD-HEAD.--This is the fastest growing and the best heading kind that I have ever grown. With this variety the ordinary gardener is able to grow as fine, large, solid heads as those grown by the professional market gardener. In shape it very much resembles a cabbage, as even the outer leaves tend to curl in over the head, instead of spreading outward, as in most lettuces. In appearance it is quite novel and striking, the edges of the leaves being tinged with a deep brownish-red, while in the centre of its hard heads the leaves are blanched to a beautiful creamy white. In quality it is remarkably tender, rich, juicy, and never bitter.

BURPEE’S TOMHANNOCK.--This is the finest of all the cutting lettuces, as it is of large size, handsome appearance, and the very choicest quality. It grows very quickly, is soon ready to cut, and stands a long time without running to seed, retaining throughout the season its delicate and delicious flavor. The growth is erect; a fully developed plant is ten to twelve inches in height, and nearly as great in diameter across the top; the outer edges of the leaves curl outward. The outer leaves are shaded with reddish-brown, while the inner leaves are almost white. It is entirely free from any bitter taste throughout the entire summer.

STONEHEAD GOLDEN YELLOW.--This is a new variety, which makes very solid heads, of handsome appearance and the finest quality. Its earliness, large, tight heads and superior quality render it one of the best kinds for forwarding under glass.

BURPEE’S SILVER BALL.--This, next to the Hard Head, is the best heading variety for general purposes, and where the brown markings in the latter kind are an objection, the gardener will find in this kind all the good qualities that go to make a desirable lettuce. It produces a beautiful head, very firm and solid, with handsomely curled leaves. The head is of a silvery white color, very rich and buttery in flavor, and stands for some time before running to seed. Other excellent varieties of cabbage lettuces are Philadelphia White Cabbage, The Hanson and The Deacon, while The Tennis Ball is a great favorite with market gardeners for forcing.

OKRA.

This plant, like the carrot, is too little grown, as its green pods impart a fine flavor and consistency to soups and mixed stews; besides being very palatable when stewed and served as is a dish of asparagus; the pods can also be dried for winter use. The seeds should be planted in drills, and if the dwarf variety be used, which I think is preferable, as it produces an abundance of pods and does not take up nearly so much room, the plants may be allowed to stand about one and a half feet apart in the row, the rows being three feet apart, though a quarter or half a row in the kitchen garden, as here described, will furnish an ample supply, both for use and drying. For either purpose, they should be cut before the pods attain their full size or they will be hard and woody. For drying, the best way is to string them on a fine wire or thread and suspend them to the rafters of a cool loft or garret until wanted for use. The culture of this vegetable is very simple, as the seeds are planted in drills about two inches deep, and the after treatment is the same as for corn.

ONIONS.

In raising onions in quantities the practice of late years has been to grow the crop from seed in one season, instead of the method formerly almost universally practiced in this section, of raising and keeping over sets to form the next year’s crop. This latter method is now only practiced to save labor in small gardens and to bring a few onions in for use early in the season.

To raise a satisfactory crop the ground must be free from weed seeds; it must be made as rich as possible and have constant cultivation from the time the seedlings break through the ground until the bulbs begin to ripen. The soil must be plowed, harrowed and raked, until it is in the finest possible condition to receive the seed, and it is important to select a plot for this purpose that has been kept free from weeds the preceding season. Root crops are the best to precede onions, as they not only leave the ground free from litter, but also, if they have been properly cultivated, leave the soil in fine tilth.

In our kitchen garden I would sow the seed in drills, twelve to fourteen inches apart, and cultivate with the wheel hoe; in field culture, or raised more extensively in the garden, plant in rows as closely as they can be worked with the cultivator, which, if it is provided with very narrow-bladed teeth, can be run through any rows where the horse can walk. For the kitchen garden, make the surface fine with a sharp steel rake, and if no drill is at hand, take a rake handle or blunt stick, and, drawing it along the garden line, scratch a drill about an inch deep. Sow the seed thinly, say an inch apart, but if there is reason to doubt the freshness of the seed, sow it thicker, so that a good stand may be assured. When the onions are an inch high, they should have their first working. Follow the wheel hoe or cultivator with a narrow-bladed hoe, not wider than an inch and a half at the cutting part of the blade; it must be sharp and lightly handled, just loosening the ground and cutting off any stray weeds. If there are no weeds the soil can be quickly loosened with a sharp steel rake. They should be worked every eight or ten days from this point until they begin to ripen; if it is neglected for longer periods than these, the gardener will rue it in days of back-breaking labor on hands and knees. When the young onions have made leaves two or three inches in height, they should be thinned out to from four to six inches apart in the rows, according to the size of the bulb made by the particular variety planted. The seed for onions grown in this way should be sown as early in the spring as the soil can be gotten into the proper fine condition, so that they may make as strong a growth as possible before the hot summer weather ripens them off. As they begin to ripen, all those with thick necks should be pulled and used upon the table, as they will not ripen properly, and if put away with the good bulbs will start all to rotting. There is a theory common with old gardeners that, by bending the tops over when they begin to ripen, the bulbs will be increased in size and will ripen more quickly; personally, I have tried it frequently, and have never been able to observe any difference in those bent and the ones left to ripen in the natural way. As soon as the bulbs are well matured, take them up at once, as a few rainy days might start them to growing again if left in the ground; pull off all the tops and roots which adhere to the dry bulbs and spread them thinly on the barn floor or on the floor of a cool loft. When it becomes too cold to let them remain longer in this position without danger of freezing, I put them in peach baskets, the stripped sides of which allow a free circulation of air, and store them in a cool, well-ventilated cellar, where we try to keep the temperature just above freezing by admitting air whenever possible, as it takes but very little warmth to start them to growing, and then they soon become unfit for use. If the gardener saves his own seed, the finest and best-shaped onions should be laid aside for planting out in the spring, for this purpose.

Where the crop is raised from sets it is not necessary, though quite desirable, to have the soil made as fine as for the seed bed. As the small onions are set in, planting at the proper distances apart, almost all the cultivation can be done with the narrow onion hoe, and if it is regularly attended to at proper intervals no hand work is necessary. The onion is a hardy bulb, and the sets can be planted as soon in the spring as the ground can be gotten into proper condition; this makes an important feature in the earliness of the crop, as the sets have several weeks the start over the onions raised from seed. For the very earliest onions, or those used when the bulb and neck are about of equal thickness early in the spring, and which go by the name of scallions, the sets are planted in October and allowed to remain in the ground all winter, so that they are ready for use almost as soon as the spring opens, two weeks’ growth sufficing to bring them to a proper size. Where the main garden crop of these fragrant bulbs is raised from seed, enough sets should be planted to make an early supply for the table; if no sets are at hand in the fall, to plant for the spring crop of scallions, they could be grown by sowing the seed about a month earlier than you would plant the sets for the same purpose.

In sowing seeds for sets the same directions apply as given for the crop of bulbs, excepting that the seed is sown much more thickly, so that the bulbs will touch each other and stand two or three wide in the row. If they do not seem to be making the proper growth as the season advances, they should be thinned to the proper extent to enable them to grow to the right size, one-half inch in diameter, though my own trouble is that they usually grow too large; to remedy this when they are nearly the proper size I allow them to become choked with grass and weeds, which checks their growth, but when this is done they must be watched that this mass of stuff does not rot them off when ripe. I think a better way would be to go along the row with a straight-edged hoe or spade and cut off some of the roots. The main object in having the sets of this small size is that they shall not run to seed when planted out in the spring. Any sets which exceed three-quarters of an inch in diameter should be used for pickling or cooking. When the sets begin to ripen it will sometimes facilitate the process to bend all the green tops over close to the bulbs, as it helps to dry and shrivel the tops more quickly. When thoroughly ripe they should be gathered at once, the tops and roots pulled off, and should be spread out and stored for winter in the same manner described for the large onions. Any of the sets that persist in growing and not drying properly, should be thrown out, or they will spoil the whole crop. If a suitable cellar or loft is not available for storing the bulbs where they will be sure not to start into growth, they may be wintered on the barn or loft floor, covering with hay as the cold weather advances. The hay should be only two inches thick at first, but should be increased to one foot in thickness as the season advances, and in the spring should be removed by the same graded process.

VARIETIES OF ONIONS.

YELLOW GLOBE DANVERS.--This is a splendid variety, and is the most popular and profitable kind to grow for market. It is similar to the Yellow Danvers as ordinarily grown, excepting in shape, which is much finer, in my opinion. No one can fail to be pleased with this fine variety when well grown. It is quite early, and is one of the very best keeping kinds.