August, 1914. 



THE CANADIAN HORTICULTURIST 



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Planting Lettuce in a Pipe Frame Greenhouse. Lord & Burnham, Construction, Toronto, Ont. 



Questioned as to his marketing me- 

 thods, Mr. Loomer replied that he 

 thought for a man lieginning in a small 

 way near a large market it would be 

 best to specialize in a few crops. In 

 his own case his market is so scattered 

 and so many small and varied orders 



come in that he is obliged to raise a 

 large variety of crops. Where the mar- 

 ket is not large in any one place, it is 

 difficult to get back the packages. When 

 near a large city one can team the pro- 

 duce and get the packages back ; other- 

 wise an additional outlay is required. 



Vegetable Growing Under Glass 



A. H. MacLennan, B.S.A., 



MARKET gardening in Ontario as a 

 business has been growing rapid- 

 ly. In growing it has changed its 

 character greatly. For many years it was 

 carried on entirely in the field. What 

 early plants that were required were pro- 

 duced in the field. But of late years the 

 grower finds that he must change many 

 of his methods, must build a greenhouse. 

 And why? 



To answer this question, if we look 

 closely we will find several reasons. 

 First, we find the city population has 

 increased ; more wealth is being added to 

 our bank account. With this increased 

 wealth has come the desire to spend 

 more freely, our tastes have changed, 

 so that now we desire to have on our 

 table many things which are out of 

 season ordinarily. 



Next the grower has come up against 

 the queslion of labor supply. The open- 

 ing up of the Canadian west ; the ease 

 with which a man may start a business 

 for himself; the sudden booms in land 

 values which often made a man wealthy 

 in a short lime ; the tendency to drift to 

 the cities in the fall, and there to re- 

 main, are the main rqtisons for this 



Macdonald College, Que. 



scarcity. The growers find they must 

 overcome this if they would succeed. 

 How can they do so? Not by following 

 the former routine. They must build 

 greenhouses wherein they can grow 

 crops winter and summer. Here they 

 can give men work the year round, 

 their own business and profits increasing 

 at the same time. They find their men 

 much better satisfied. The wet dis- 

 agreeable work which formerly often had 

 to be done when transplanting their crops 

 in hotbeds is now done in warmth and 

 comfort. The plants themselves do bet- 

 ter. 



Lastly arises the question of earliness. 

 Anyone who has had any connection with 

 gardening in Ontario knows that to ob- 

 tain the best prices one must try to have 

 his produce on the market earlier than 

 his neighbor. While this was done, for- 

 merly in hotbeds, the labor required to 

 operate them and uncertainty of weather 

 conditions during the transplanting per- 

 iod, made too much of a handicap. Much 

 better plants came from the greenhouse ; 

 he could start earlier and thus gain time. 



Greenhouses in Onlario to-day are 

 mainly of four types. The first is the 



sash house, made by two sash fastened 

 together in the shape of an A (inverted 

 V) with a path dug out eighteen inches 

 to two feet in the centre for working. 

 This type is heated by a stove and is 

 used only to produce early plants for 

 outside planting. The second has wood- 

 en sides, four feet high, and glass roof ; 

 is fourteen feet wide, with no supports 

 for the roof. This house is good for 

 winter lettuce growing and early plants 

 in spring, while under the benches one 

 can force rhubarb. The third type, and 

 the one most commonly fourud in On- 

 tario, is called the pipe frame. These 

 houses are generally thirty or forty feet 

 wide with two or more rows of supports 

 made of pipe. This type of house ap- 

 peals to the grower, since he can <r«<t il 

 himself. The fourth type is the flit iron 

 rafter house. This house is more expen- 

 sive but lasts longer and is much strong- 

 er. It requires few repairs little glass 

 is broken, things which soon would make 

 up for any saving in first erection cost. 



To-day we find most of our growers 

 devoting their house to the growth of 

 lettuce with spring crops of cucumbers 

 and tomatoes. Some grow tomatoes in 

 the fall and spring with a crop of lettuce 

 in between. Other crops that might be 

 grown are peppers and cauliflower. The 

 diversity of crops grown will soon be as 

 great as outside. 



One must not think, however, that 

 greenhouse growing of crops is easy. 

 Some people will say, "Oh, you have 

 everything under your control ; you can 

 make the weather to suit yourself." 

 While this may be true, still one must 

 remember heat requires coal to make it ; 

 coal costs money. Again nature takes 

 much greater advantage of any slip we 

 may lake. Much more so than outside, 

 and slips soon eat up the profits. 



Practical Pointers 



It is more economical to purchase one 

 ton of high grade fertilizer than three 

 tons of low grade. 



The planting of strawberries is pre- 

 ferably done in August, the soil having 

 been used to produce early vegetables, 

 which will have been removed before 

 the end of the month. — W. A. Dier, 

 Ottawa, Ont. 



"The fruit on lime soils is often small- 

 er, unless much humus is present ; but 

 the statement made in Eiurope that cul- 

 tivated fruits, and especially grapes, are 

 sweeter on calcareous soils, is abundant- 

 ly verified in the native fruits of the Miss- 

 issippi valley states as elsewhere; where 

 the various wild berries, haws, plums, 

 etc., are well known to the younger part 

 of the population to be much sweeter and 

 higher flavored in certain (calcareous) 

 localities than in others, besides being 

 usually more abundant." — Hilgard. 



