104 TURNIP. 



best in such soils as are nearest like their own native soil. 

 As we have not always a choice, I would inform the Young 

 Gardener, if he has a very light soil, which is not suitable 

 for vegetables in general, he may sometimes get two crops of 

 Turnips from it in one year, by sowing seed for the first crop 

 in March, and that for his second about the middle of August. 

 For general crops, it will be better to have ground manured 

 with short rotten dung, or compost containing a considerable 

 proportion of coal, wood, peat, or soapers' ashes. Ground 

 that has been well manured for preceding crops, and also 

 ground fresh broken up, will do well for Turnips. 



It is important that particular attention be paid to the time 

 of sowing the seed ; for if the first crop be not sown soon 

 enough to be gathered early in July, they are seldom fit for 

 the table, being hot, stringy, and wormy ; and if the crop in- 

 tended for autumn and winter use is sown before August, 

 unless it be a very favourable season, if they even escape 

 the attacks of insects and reptiles, they often get so defective, 

 that they seldom keep through the winter.* 



To have Turnips in perfection, they should be hoed in 

 about a month after they are sown, or by the time the plants 

 have spread to a circle of about four inches, and again about 

 a month from the first hoeing, leaving them from six to nine 

 inches apart. They will yield the cultivator more profit 

 when treated in this way, than when left to nature, as is too 

 frequently done. 



* Previous to sowing Turnip seed, the gardener should procure a suitable 

 quantity of lime, soot, or tobacco dust, so as to be prepared for the attacks 

 of insects. It should be recollected that Turnip seed will sometimes sprout 

 within forty-eight hours after it is sown, and that very frequently whole 

 crops are devoured before a plant is seen above ground. A peck of either 

 of these ingredients, mixed with about an equal quantity of ashes, or even 

 dry road dust, scattered over the ground, morning and evening, for the first 

 week after sowing the seed, would secure an acre of ground, provided the 

 composition be used in such a way that the wind carry it over the whole 

 plot ; and as the wind often changes, this end may be effected by crossing 

 the land in a different direction each time, according as the wind may serve. 

 If gardeners who raise Radishes, Cabbage, and such other vegetables as are 

 subject to the attacks of insects, were to pursue this course, they would 

 save themselves from considerable loss. 



