LETTUCE ALL THE YEAR. 273 



arisen new opportunity for forcing and shipment of let- 

 tuce considerable distances by rail has advanced notably 

 during the last decade. In central California cities dur- 

 ing the season of heaviest rains it is hard to get bright, 

 clean lettuces from local market gardens and much is 

 brought from the Los Angeles district where there is less 

 rain and more winter sunshine. It is to be expected that 

 as population increases there will be a better opportunity 

 for local forcing enterprises which can be conducted with 

 slight structures and a minimum of artificial heat. 



Culture. Lettuce can be sown on moist ground the year 

 round. It is exceedingly rapid in development, and can be 

 grown as a catch crop among slower growing vegetables 

 at all times of the year. It starts readily from the seed, 

 and the most common practice is to sow a thin drill of it 

 here or there, as interspace is to be for a short time un- 

 occupied, thinning the plants at the first weeding and al- 

 lowing them to head in the thinned row. This is the 

 simplest practice, and will be most generally followed in 

 the farm garden. And yet it is so easy to imitate the mar- 

 ket gardeners and put in transplanted lettuces here and 

 there, wherever an unoccupied corner appears, that this 

 practice must be urged even for the simplest gardening 

 provided that the plants are not tucked in in such a way 

 that hand-work is required where the horse should do it. 



Wherever a winter or early spring vegetable is cleared 

 away a due share of lettuce should go in. Wherever a 

 summer vegetable yields the ground, the soil should be 

 well soaked and cultivated and the lettuce should not be 

 overlooked. As soon as the fall rains sufficiently wet the 

 ground, lettuce should be among the first sowings. And 

 before the winter comes on, with its heavy rains, a warm 

 ridge or raised bed should have its lettuce covering under- 

 way so that midwinter shall not lack its supply of salad. 

 And in February, as the ground is again suited for flat 

 culture, new sowings of lettuce should be among the first 

 things done. Thus it is seen that lettuce is to be sown all 

 the year and plucked all the year in California. 



