216 CROP GROWING AND CROP FEEDING 



tightly to each plant by hand. As the nights grow cool earthing is continued 

 in the same manner, only that as each pair of rows is earthed the soil is drawn 

 down level, and before loosening the strings a ridge of soil is laid between 

 the rows and not pulled down, so as to keep the plants in narrow trenches 

 nearly even with the tops, and thus induce them to draw up erect. At next 

 earthing this ridge is pulled flat and another set up. While earthing up the 

 rows the soil is carried up outside the ends of the rows six inches or more 

 thick, so that when finally earthed up, the bed is six feet wide. The earthing 

 is continued till late in December, and then, as far north as Baltimore, a 

 thick layer of earth is placed over the whole and covered with straw or forest 

 leaves, and corn stalks, for the winter. From North Carolina southward 

 the final covering should be of pine leaves placed on thickly, with no earth 

 cover on top ; which will generally have to be increased during the winter as 

 the hardy celery never really stops growing here. Celery is the most labori- 

 ous crop of the market gardener, but at the same time, when well grown and 

 put in market in good shape, it is one of the most profitable. I should 

 have said that the eight foot spaces between the beds must be kept well culti- 

 vated and fine for shoveling. 



OUR METHODS OF BLANCHING CELERY. 



A practice has grown up in sections North, where the crop can be grown 

 early in Summer, of placing boards on each side of the single rows, so that 

 the celery is crowded for light and runs up tall and tender. This method is 

 used only for early celery, since the boards would not be a sufficient protec- 

 tion against the cold late in the season. The self blanching varieties are used 

 for this crop more than others, and, in fact, the self blanching sorts are only 

 fit for such treatment, as they are far inferior in quality to those kinds that 

 are commonly grown and blanched by earthing. They make beautiful, white 

 stalks, but the quality is very inferior. 



While in the northern parts of the country celery is largely grown on 

 black, peaty, marsh land, where it attains a fine size and appearance, in 

 quality this celery is far inferior to that grown on a moist and fertile clay 

 soil; being more pithy and hollow stalked. The finest quality of celery is 

 that grown from a good strain of seed on a clay soil of good fertility, and 

 irrigated, as needed, in dry weather. While it may not be so large and showy 

 as the product of the marshes, it is far superior in solidity and crispness, qual- 

 ities essential to a fine celery. 



In regard to the fertilizing of the celery crop the following from Bulle- 

 tin No. 132 of the Cornell University Experiment Station will be of interest, 



