104 REPORT ON TURNIPS FOR SEED. 



Ling even for a single night. Nothing will heat more readily ; 

 and heated seed will always have a bad smell, spoiling the 

 sample and growing power, and consequently be depreciated in 

 value. 



An average crop may be from 18 to 20 bushels per acre, 

 although 1 have frequently seen harvested from 25 to 30 bushels 

 per acre. Perhaps the latter is more the exception than the 

 rule, as in bad seasons, by frost or blight, I have seen no more 

 than three or four bushels per acre harvested ; but after a 

 thorough knowledge has been obtained by actual experience how 

 and when to tid the necessary operations, the crops will increase 

 in a corresponding degree. The swede is apt to run into a sort 

 of stem, and in saving seed these ought to be avoided. 



2. The Common Turnip (Brassica Rajm, Purple-top yellow). — 

 They are rather difficult to keep pure, being liable to lose much 

 of their yellow colour, and get very pale. They require careful 

 attention, and the stock should be renewed frequently. I recollect 

 of having a very fine stock of this variety both as to shape and 

 purple colour, but deficient in the yellow. I picked about a couple 

 of dozens of the very finest of thern, and a like quantity of green- 

 top yellow, rich in colour, and fine shape. I planted them to- 

 gether, striving to catch the yellow from the green-top, and think- 

 ing to impart it to the purple-top. From this stock the first year 

 I had a strange assortment of purple, bronze, and green tops, and 

 from these I picked about a dozen of the finest as to mould and 

 colour it was ever my lot to look on. These I saved the third 

 year, but was sadly disappointed to find green-tops still appearing ; 

 and for the third time I picked and saved with the same result. 

 However, I recrossed them with the finest I could get from com- 

 mon stock of purple-top, and these I hybridised. In short, I was 

 eight years in arriving at anything like perfection, but now I 

 have got from this stock some real gems. The same treatment in 

 sowing and harvesting as with the swedes will answer this 

 variety, strict watch being kept over them when in flower to get 

 quit of all the pale-fleshed ones, which, as formerly stated, are 

 easily detected by the brightness of the flower. 



3. GREEN-Tor Yellow. — This turnip is, perhaps, somewhat 

 softer than the purple-top, but is of equal if not superior quality, 

 and the mode of cultivation is the same in every respect. In 

 picking for stock seed, keep out all those with strong shaws and 

 pale in colour. 



■4. White Globe. — A most beautiful turnip, large cropper, and 

 excellent for feeding in early winter. It spoils sooner than any 

 of those before described, but is very useful. It is rather diffi- 

 cult to get over the winter for seed. It should be sown rather 

 later than those already referred to (indeed all the varieties here 

 mentioned ought to be sown in the order given), for in a good 



