48 MARKET GARDENING. 



germination the first year, and often not half that the 

 second, and sometimes less. Beet seed containing from 

 three to fiye germs to the single capsule will often 

 develop three hundred shoots to a hundred seeds, but 

 after a period of four years the percentage of yitality 

 will fall to twenty-five per cent., though the writer has 

 now growing a ten acre crop from a lot of select seed of 

 Bassano beet eight years old. American grown onion 

 and leek seed varies from seventy to ninety per cent, in 

 vitality the first year, falling to about sixty the second 

 year and thirty the third. These seeds of English and 

 French growth, wlien brought to the United States, sel- 

 dom have a vitality of two-thirds of the percentage of the 

 American. Frequently the best English leek seed can- 

 not be found to shoW' over twenty-five per cent. Radish, 

 if of American growth, should have a vitality of ninety 

 to ninety^-five per cent, the first year, and will diminish 

 ten per cent, for four or five years. Of European growth 

 it seldom has over seventy per cent, vitality the first 

 year, ofttimes not more than fifty j)er cent., and the 

 second year frequently falling to twenty-five per cent., 

 and sometimes less, by reason of the conditions of exces- 

 sive moisture undei" wiiich it is harvested and cured, 

 and the moisture absorbed during the ocean voyage. 



Lettuce, endive, celery and tomato being seeds dif- 

 ficult in the separation after threshing of the good from 

 the bad, seldom have a vitality of over eighty per cent. 

 Lettuce and endive, however, are very retentive of ger- 

 minating quality, falling not more than ten per cent. 

 per annum, annually, for three or four years, after which 

 they decline rapidly to nothing, celery and tomato being 

 least vital. 



Peas, w^ell riddled and hand picked, should have a 

 vitality the first year, if harvested in dry weather, of 

 ninety-five per cent., the second year eighty per cent., 

 the third year sixty per cent., after which they will 



