EXrERIMENTAL GARDENING 185 



of vegetables (all of them available for table use when 

 exhibited) at the county fair held August 22, 23 and 

 24, winning the first prize awarded for the best exhi- 

 bition of vegetables. 



The results obtained have confirmed my judgment 

 in making conservation of moisture the principal con- 

 sideration throughout all my garden operations from 

 the very beginning, and unquestionably, to my mind, 

 the one factor which contributed more to that end than 

 all else was the regular daily cultivation of one-half 

 the garden, going completely over the entire garden 

 every other day. This I would in no wise have been 

 able to accomplish without my hand cultivators, one 

 and a half to two hours each day sufficing for a boy 

 to do what, by ordinary methods, would require a man 

 nearly all the time to do less satisfactorily. By this 

 means a fine loose mulch was maintained over the 

 entire garden, in which the moisture capillarity was 

 constantly broken up, and the moisture in the soil pre- 

 vented from reaching the surface to be dissipated by 

 the sun and air. 



Total value of products, fifty-one dollars and 

 ninety-six cents ; fertilizer, twelve dollars and twenty- 

 five cents ; seed, five dollars and eighty-five cents ; plow- 

 ing and planting, three dollars and fifty cents ; cultiva- 

 tion by man at one dollar per day, seven dollars and 

 sixty-one cents ; work by boy at fifty cents per day, 

 four dollars and sixty cents ; interest on garden and 

 tools, twelve dollars and sixty-six cents ; net profit, 

 five dollars and forty-nine cents. 



A Melon Garden. — An interesting story was con- 

 tributed by W. D, Hinds, Worcester county, Massa- 

 chusetts, w^ho is one of the best known peach growers 

 in New England. He selected a half-acre patch which 

 two years before was rough, rocky pasture, cleared off 

 part of the rocks and set it to peaches. As a garden 



