Vegetable Growing for Market 129 



23. PARSNIPS 



The Parsnip (Pastinaca sativa) has been grown since Roman times, 

 and has no doubt been derived from the Wild Parsnip of Europe and 

 Britain. Indeed this has been proved by Professor James Buckman, who 

 in 1848 sowed seeds of the wild plant, and succeeded in obtaining three 

 distinct forms by selection in four or five years. One of these was intro- 

 duced to commerce in 1860, and is still popular under the name of 

 "Student". It has a concave or hollow crown, and is thus distinct from 

 the common form, which has a convex, rounded crown. 



It seems strange that such an important market -garden crop as the 

 Parsnip should not be mentioned in the Returns of the Board of Agricul- 

 ture. It is probably lumped with "other crops". The Department of 

 Agriculture and Technical 

 Instruction for Ireland, how- 

 ever, takes notice of it, and 

 for the year 1908 records 

 641 ac. as being grown in 

 Ireland, Leinster having 318 

 ac., and the county of Dublin 

 157 ac. The total yield is 

 given as 7238 tons, being an 

 average of 1T2 tons per acre. 

 This is a poor crop, so far as 

 weight is concerned, for such 

 a heavy plant as the Parsnip. jllffP^ 



As the plants are Usually Fig . 482.-Parsnips- 'Tender "and True" 



grown in rows about 15 in. 



apart, and about 9 in. apart in the rows, there would be about 43,560 roots 

 to the acre if there were no gaps or failures. As anything like a Parsnip 

 will weigh at least 1 lb., there should be about 19 tons per acre under 

 favourable cultural conditions. Even if 25 per cent is deducted for failures, 

 the crop would come to at least 14 tons. [j. w.] 



This important crop has three advantages it affords a change from 

 the large family of vegetables liable to club; it remains in the land with- 

 out injury from frost all the winter; and, finally, being a deep-rooted 

 crop, the physical effects of the roots forcing their way down into the 

 subsoil and of their swelling in the soil are very valuable. 



Stable manure is not to be recommended in preparation for a crop of 

 Parsnips; it is apt to leave the land hollow and to encourage the formation 

 of "chumps" in the place of straight-rooted plants. The land, however, 

 should be deeply subsoiled, and the previous crop should have sufficient 

 manure to leave the land in good heart. If manure at all is needed for the 

 Parsnip crop a good compounded ordinary market-garden chemical manure 



may be used, or the land may be dressed with 4 cwt. of agricultural salt and 

 VOL. iv. 54 



