October: Fourth Week 



FRESH VEGETABLES ALL WINTER: PLAN TO 

 KEEP THE SMALL GREENHOUSE BUSY WITH 

 SUCCESSION CROPS UNTIL SPRING 



At least some of the fresh vegetables which winter gar- 

 dening makes possible should be enjoyed by every possessor 

 of a greenhouse, no matter how small it is. Anyone whose 

 gardening experience has been confined wholly to crops out- 

 of-doors will be surprised at the very small amount of space 

 required to furnish the average home table with such fresh 

 vegetables as are usually forced during the winter months. 

 Take lettuce, for instance: in the garden, under what you 

 consider intensive cultivation, you plant it 12 inches apart 

 each way 144 square inches to a plant. Under glass, it 

 can be grown as close together as 6 inches each way for the 

 loose leaf kind, and 7x7 inches for the heading sort 36 and 

 49 square inches, respectively! At the former distance, on 

 a bench space only 3x6 feet, seventy-two heads can be 

 grown. True, for commercial purposes, these distances are 

 usually increased an inch each way; but, where the crop is 

 to be used for the home table, and where every other head 

 can be taken out, before they are quite matured, the dis- 

 tances named are ample. 



I have grown tomatoes successfully as close together as 

 1 8 inches each way; and in a small greenhouse, where many 

 flowers are grown, and where space is not available for 

 tomatoes, I have seen them grown successfully in wooden 

 boxes about 15 inches square and 8 deep, which were placed 

 upon the floor in positions where the vines could be trained 

 up. In both cases they were, of course, trained to a single 

 stalk and a great deal of the foliage removed. Cucumbers 

 may be handled in much the same way. Where forced 

 commercially, they are usually given at least 8 feet of head 



276 



