366 MINNESOTA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 
dealer’s hands until the germs of decayand even of disease,have es- 
tablished a foothold. At the side of such, place a few of our choicest 
home-grown melons, fresh from the vines and make a test of their 
comparative merits. Then see if you do not wish that the Southern 
melon, which cost you near the price of a bushel of wheat, had fallen 
into the hands of some friendly darkey (instead of a shipper), and 
that you had grown a hundred melons where the bushel of wheat 
was harvested. 
There is constant improvement going on in the line of vegetables, 
as wellas elsewhere. We are too apt to set our heart on some old 
variety and cling to it until the wide-awake portion of the world 
has passed far ahead of us with something better. It is to our in- 
terest to keep an eye open for new things, and to make an occasional 
trial of them, even if they do not turn out exactly as the seedsman’s 
colored plates represent them. 
It costs so little in either time or money to testa new vegetable. 
Itis quite different from putting money into unknown trees for an 
apple orchard, where years of care and waiting must pass before 
the resultis known. Of course a feverish haste to grab at everything 
advertised as a novelty might be as bad as getting into the narrow- 
est of ruts. It is only a wisely discriminating outlook for better 
varieties that is here recommended, where it may take the place of 
an oyster-like contentment with inferior things. 
VEGETABLES. 
WM. LYONS, MINNEAPOLIS. 
As a whole, 1894 was a very disastrous one for market gardeners 
in the vicinity of the twin cities. April was very wet and warm, as 
was also the first ten days in May; the land was so wet it was almost 
impossible to sow seeds, and much of it was sown in the mud- 
About May 15th, the weather cleared off, and it became very warm, 
dry and windy. The land dried up very rapidly, and became so 
hard thatit was almost impossible for the young plants to push 
through. As soon as the land could be worked, I commenced to 
plant about thirty-five acres of potatoes. The first planting was the 
best. I usedthe Aspinwall planter. Several farmers were using the 
same planter from one to two days a week according as they were 
ready to useit; in this way my planting continued for about three 
weeks. 
The first ten acres yielded ninety bushels, the second planting 
about sixty, the third planting forty bushels per acre; all were 
planted alike, the same kind of seed and cultivation. I harrowed 
several times before they came up and once after, used a Planet, Jr. 
cultivator and worked the potatoes as nearly level as possible. 
It continued hot and dry for about four months—only twice in 
that time did rain enough fall to lay the dust fora few hours. In 
some places local showers did lots of good, but I did not happen 
to be init. The result was a partial failure of nearly allvegetables, 
and in some instances a total failure. 
