206 CROP GROWING AND CROP FEEDING 



largely mixed with plants that made round heads, and which were later. 

 This mixture was a great annoyance to the gardener, as it caused the crop to 

 hold the ground, too long, and gave him fewer of the earliest ones which bring 

 the best price. The selection of late years has been to separate the two types 

 so that the round headed ones come in as summer, or succession/cabbages, fol- 

 lowing up the early ones in a uniform type. There are other extra early 

 cabbages of similar type to the Wakefield, with small heads and earlier even 

 than the Wakefield. The best of these -which we have tested is the Extra 

 Early Pilot. 



SUCCESSION, OR SUMMER, CABBAGES. 



While the first early cabbages should always be sown in the fall, whether 

 they are to be wintered over in frames or set on ridges, we have found that 

 the succession crop to follow these is always best sown either in boxes in the 

 greenhouse or in hot beds in January, and hardened off in cold frames. Sown 

 in the fall they are far more apt to disappoint the grower by running to seed 

 in the spring than are the extra early sorts. The best method we have used 

 with this class of cabbages is to sow the seed in the greenhouse in flats in 

 January. As soon as the plants are large enough to handle, even before they 

 have made anything but the seed leaves, we prepare other flats about three 

 inches deep, by putting an inch of well rotted manure in the bottom, and 

 then filling with good potting compost. The plants are transplanted into 

 these about one and a half inches apart, and are kept in a cool greenhouse till 

 they get started in the soil. We then place the flats in the cold frames, and 

 protect them for a while with mats over the glass on cold nights, and later 

 on give all the air practicable. They grow off rapidly and are ready to go 

 into the field as early as the ground can be gotten into good condition. In 

 the colder sections of the country, this plan is the best for the extra early crop 

 as well, since the plants can be had of good size as early as it will be practica- 

 ble to set them, and it is a great deal less trouble than wintering them over 

 in cold frames. For a succession cabbage we use what is known as Summer 

 cabbage, Succession, Improved Brunswick and Maulers Midsummer. 

 Maule's Deep Head is a fine improvement on our old favorite, Fottler's Bruns- 

 wick, and we are not sure but that it will take the first place as a succession 

 cabbage for summer use. 



LATE CABBAGES. 



The late cabbage crop for winter use is a very important one in the 

 northern parts of the country and in the elevated mountain sections of the 

 South, where the late cabbage crop has of late years become an important 

 matter commercially, as a crop for shipping to the coast country of the South, 



