Market Gardening and Truck Farming 17 



will under no consideration fit into successful market gardening 

 or truck farming; " barter and trade " is one of the essentials of 

 the business anywhere, and the grower must be in readiness, if 

 an emergency arises, to take hold and become merchant or 

 peddler. This feature is an indispensable part of the business in 

 most cases. 



Gardening for money requires unceasing attention, close 

 and thorough management, considerable hard labor, and often 

 more or less exposure to the vicissitudes and inclemencies of the 

 seasons. Nevertheless it is true that the majority of the profes- 

 sion make altogether too much work of it, especially by neglect- 

 ing to make use of the newer improved implements of tillage. 

 The hand hoe is yet left to play a by far too prominent part in 

 garden, culture, and the advantages of the wheel-hoe are not yet 

 recognized and made use of as they deserve. 



There was a time when even the rudest methods combined 

 with hard work insured to the market gardener near large cities a 

 good income. But competition has grown with the demand, and 

 with cheapened and increased production prices have gradually 

 declined until now they are far below what only a few years ago 

 growers would have considered mere cost of production. It is 

 not so many years since the main crop of strawberries sold at 25 

 cents per quart; and when the price first dropped down to 20 

 cents, the cry went forth that "Strawberry growing does not 

 pay." Then thousands of growers abandoned the business in 

 disgust. At present, strawberries are grown at 6 and 8 cents per 

 quart in many localities, and people are satisfied with the profits. 

 So with vegetables. We have learned to produce much cheaper 

 than formerly, and we can afford to produce and sell at figures 

 which did not cover first cost ten or twenty years ago, and yet 

 realize a fair profit. Hence people who continue to grow garden 

 crops in the old laborious and unsatisfactory ways, and with old- 

 style implements, who produce inferior vegetables and fruits at 

 old-time cost, cannot successfully meet the competition of their 

 progressive brethren. This is simply a question of the "survival 

 of the fittest; " and the fittest is the man who by taking advan- 

 tage of the latest labor-saving methods and devices manages to 

 raise the best produce at the smallest cost, thus preserving or 

 even widening the narrow margin of profit which at the present 

 time characterizes all legitimate branches of business. The spade 

 must give way to the plow ; the rake, and often cultivator also, to 

 the harrow ; hand and fingers in sowing seeds to the drill ; the 

 hand hoe to the wheel-hoe, etc. These changes are imperative 

 and unavoidable, if the business is to be made profitable. The 

 grower who has learned to produce most cheaply and can offer 

 the earliest or best articles in his line, is the one who succeeds ; 

 and efforts to excel must be made continuously to prevent 



