STATE HORTICULTUEAL SOCIETY. 21 



In our section, to grow vegetables of most any kind success- 

 fully, excepting, perhaps, two kinds, tomatoes and sweet potatoes, 

 manure must be applied and incorporated in the soil with a lavish and 

 liberal hand; this is difficult and expensive to obtain; we have long 

 since past the period when the stables were moved to get away from 

 the manure — we have to pay for it now all it is worth, and often 

 more, but cannot raise good vegetables without it. 



The wording of the question I have to present you is rather 

 ambiguous — the three most important vegetables for the home gar- 

 den, is a question in which we may find plenty of room to differ. 

 Variety has much to do with our health. No home should be with- 

 out its kitchen garden, where there are vegetables in variety to sup- 

 ply the table the whole year, but as some varieties are difficult to 

 raise they will necessarily have to be purchased from those who are 

 experts and are fixed to grow them. Yet there are very many fam- 

 ilies that are very poorly supplied with vegetables that are of the 

 earliest and most simple to raise, and of these the potato stands 

 first in importance, in a commercial point of view as well as a life- 

 sustaining, health-giving vegetable food, for man and beast. 



I do not claim to be an expert in vegetable gardening, yet I do 

 pride myself in the fact that 1 have had a wide and varied experi- 

 ence in the different branches of gardening, extending back forty 

 years. 



The potato, which, in its wild state, is found in the mountains 

 and valleys of the Rio Grande, is found for sale in endless varieties 

 in its improved state in every city, town and village throughout the 

 civilized world. Who ever heard of a family being troubled with 

 scurvy and the various skin diseases where potatoes were abundant 

 and plentifully used as a diet. Potatoes can be grown successfully 

 over a larger space of God's foot-stool than perhaps any other veg- 

 etable. Fair crops of potatoes may be grown without manure, on 

 pasture or clover sod, plowed under in October and planted in early 

 spring; but we realize the fact that on heavy clay soil no crop will 

 pay better for liberal manuring than potatoes, excepting, perhaps, 

 asparagus. 



I know no better way to procure a crop of potatoes on the farm 

 or in the village lot, than to plow your ground deep and harrow the 

 first days it will do to plow in early spring; mark out your furrows 

 three feet apart on your prepared ground and four inches deep; 

 spread your manure quite thickly in the furrow at the rate of ten 

 two-horse loads per half acre; drop the potatoes in the furrow on the 

 manure ten inches apart; cover with plow. The ground should be 

 harrowed in eight days, to keep the weeds in check until the potatoes 

 show themselves, they should then be hoed at once, and then run the 

 cultivator between the rows of ten, enough to keep the ground loose 

 and to keep the weeds down. About the time the first bloom ap- 

 pears the soil should be laid up on each side to form a slight ridge to 



