DAIRY MEETING. I35 



MARKET GARDENING. 



By H. C. Thompson, Asst. Horticulturist, U. S. Dept. of 

 Agriculture, Washington, D. C. 



No section in the United States has as good home gardens 

 as New England and in no section is the market garden indus- 

 try better developed than in parts of New England. The 

 people of this region have learned the value of vegetables as 

 articles of food, and as a commercial crop. In many sections 

 vegetables are produced for distant markets and the local 

 markets are neglected. These local markets must either do 

 without the products or get them from a distance. It is for 

 the purpose of interesting you in supplying your own needs 

 and the local demand that I am making this talk to you today. 

 I am told that the vegetables used by the summer hotels in 

 this region are shipped in from other sections and other states. 

 This is wrong, for you are sending money out of the commu- 

 nity that should be kept at home. No part of the farm pays 

 as well as the vegetable garden. In fact, according to the 

 census reports, an acre in vegetables brings in as much money 

 as 10 acres of common farm crops. I do not mean that the 

 profit will be ten times as great per acre, but the gross returns 

 will be that much, and no doubt the profit is several times 

 greater, under good management. 



Before anyone should go into a new line of business he 

 should make a study of it and he should have a love for it. A 

 man who has no love for plants could not make a success of 

 market gardening. The market gardener needs to be more than 

 a grower to be successful. He must be a good business man 

 for he will have to be his own salesman, and to sell the products 

 to good advantage he must be a good salesman. Many garden- 

 ers make a success of growing the crops and still fail in their 



