170 TOMATO, 
should average 4 lbs. to the plant. In a good crop of 
tomatoes, the fruits should average about three to a 
cluster in winter, and about four or five in spring. Fig. 
58 (page 171) shows a good cluster of forced tomatoes. 
We have made experiments to determine if the second 
crop from the plant is influenced by the amount of the 
first crop. The tests were made with both buried and 
sprout plants. For one series we used the plants which 
bore the heaviest midwinter crop, and for the other those 
which stood in partial shade and had borne nothing. 
The results show that the first crop did not influence the 
bearing capacity of the second stage so long as the parent 
plants remained healthy. And they also show that 
amount of crop is not a fixed trait of the individual 
plant; 7. e., a plant which bears little at first may bear 
heavily the second time, and vice versa. 
The actual figures of yields and prices of commercial 
growers of forced tomatoes will be helpful. In a certain 
crop of Lorillard tomatoes, 673 plants, the total pickings 
were as follows: 
For ‘Marche. oom. 3s ea a eee 15 Ibs 
6: April. sb 2 0% nas ee eee 783 
Bf May sce ae ee a Pe ae eh 862 ‘ 
“June. e, oe Se on a Be GOS, tes 
PUY ec on aie aes eee to (> suede 2350 
2003 sem 
This is -is an average of 4.3 lbs. per plant. This is a 
large average yield. In midwinter, the crop could not be 
expected to be much more than half this amount. These 
plants were trained to a single stem. 
Following are extracts from the letters of four 
growers : 
“We set our plants about 2x 2% ft. One house, 112 ft. 
long by 23 ft. wide, had 8 rows of plants and about 54 
per row, and yielded over 4,000 lbs. of fruit from De- 
cember 20 to July 1. My recollection is that you grew 
much closer together and had about the same yield per 
