Vegetable Growing for Market 181 



The Black Blotch or bacterial disease attacks the ripening fruit of 

 Tomatoes, although often earlier. It is said that the disease is caused 

 by insects visiting the flowers and depositing the bacteria on the stigma. 

 Insect visits to Tomato flowers are few and far between, and it is question- 

 able if that is the right cause. It may be more likely to arise from mulch- 

 ings or topdressings of stable manure often given to save watering. In 

 any case the diseased fruits should be picked off when noticed, and burned. 

 Spraying with insecticides, as often recommended, when the plants are in 

 flower would do more harm than good, as the pollen would be wetted and 

 thus prevented from being blown on to the stigmas to fertilize the young 

 fruits. The safer plan would be keeping the ground clean by occasional 

 hoeing or freshening up, plenty of air on all favourable days, proper 

 watering, and shaking the plants at midday to distribute the pollen. It 

 would be advisable also to dust the soil occasionally with flowers of 

 sulphur. 



Market Varieties of Tomato. Growers for market insist upon tomatoes 

 having a good rich crimson- red colour, roundish billiard -ball- like shape and 

 size, free-cropping qualities, large trusses, and a skin that is not too tender 

 and easily broken. There are many varieties of Tomatoes that will not 

 come up to all these tests. Intelligent growers now take as much care in 

 grading their Tomato fruits into various sizes firsts, seconds, and thirds 

 or "smalls" as a rule; but one or two exceptions to the general rule make 

 as many as seven grades. Amongst the varieties useful for market work 

 are: Balch's Fillbasket, Chemin Rouge, Challenger, Hillside Comet, Ham 

 Green Favourite, Holmes's Supreme, Lister's Prolific, Perfection, Stirling 

 Castle, Sunrise (Carter's), Tuckswood Favourite, Winter Beauty, The 

 Comet, The Cropper, and Up-to-Date. 



It should be mentioned that many growers prefer their own selection. 

 Of the varieties mentioned above some prefer one, some the other. It 

 is therefore impossible to say that one is in any way superior to the 

 other. [j. w.] 



32. TURNIPS 



The Turnip has developed from a hardy British biennial (Brassica 

 Rapa), and, with the Swede (B. campestris Rutabaga), constitutes a very 

 important Cruciferous crop in all parts of the British Islands, from the 

 Orkneys to Land's End, in Great Britain, and from Donegal to Cork and 

 Wexford, in Ireland. The French Turnips are descended from B. No pus, 

 and are considered to be sweeter and better flavoured than the Common 

 Turnip. According to the Returns of the Board of Agriculture and the 

 Department of Technical Instruction, Ireland, there are in round figures 

 about 1.800,000 ac. in the United Kingdom devoted to Turnips and Swedes, 

 the last-named being, of course, more a farmer's crop than a market gar- 

 dener's. The largest Turnip- and Swede-growing counties in England are: 

 Yorkshire, 175,000 ac.; Norfolk, 110,000 ac.: Lincolnshire, 109,000 ac.; 

 Hampshire, 54,000 ac.; Devon, 48,000 ac.: Suffolk, 44,000 ac.; Wilts, 



