PLANTING PUT IN HILLS 117 



where the plants are to be set. If the board is carefully used the 

 bed may be quickly set with plants which will stand in straight lines 

 both ways. Standing on the board while planting prevents impact- 

 ing the ground surface and disfiguring it with footprints. 



Plants Ready Grown in Hills for Transplanting. All seed- 

 lings which it is desirable to grow in groups or hills are very neatly 

 and safely handled by the use of inverted sods in connection with 

 the hot-box already described. This can be done with sods of 

 native growth six inches square and four inches deep or alfalfa 

 can be grown in seed boxes on which sods will form sufficiently in 

 six weeks from sowing the seed. Make a temporary floor of old 

 boards on top of the packed manure of the hot-box. The inverted 

 sods are then packed closely on this floor with the grass gathered 

 in nicely under each sod. Exactly in the middle of each inverted 

 sod thrust a small stick, and after scarifying each sod thoroughly 

 aft inch or two in depth with an old caseknife, carefully put over 

 the whole bed two inches of rich compost, made of fine creek sand, 

 and decayed sods, a year or two old, mixed with fine sweepings 

 from the cow-yard gathered in summer and protected from winter 

 rains. Tamp this prepared soil pretty firmly with the back of a 

 hoe, and plant the seeds an inch or so in depth around each stick 

 which serves to indicate the middle of each sod. Plant six to eight 

 seeds in a hill, leaving finally three of the strongest plants. A box 

 three by two feet will hold twenty-four sods, which may be planted 

 for two hills of cucumbers, six of muskmelons, six of watermelons, 

 and ten hills of pole beans, or eight hills of beans and two hills of 

 summer squashes, and these will furnish a family of five all it can 

 use if the plants are well taken care of. The box for early plants 

 should be placed on the south side of a shed or barn in order to pro- 

 tect it from strong north winds, heavy cold rains, as well as danger 

 of frosts, and should be watered as needed with lukewarm water 

 Transplant the sods when safe by running a wide shingle or spade 

 on the floor under each sod. In planting out the sods must be well 

 bedded in moist soil which is closely firmed around them and the 

 surface kept loose. 



Open Air Seed-Beds. But though the amateur should know 

 all these ways of growing seedlings for transplanting by such de- 

 vices as have been described, he should be assured that very much 

 can be done by growing seedlings in the open air and open ground 

 without artificial heat or protection. Seed beds are made for 

 this purpose exactly as they are for growing vegetables without 

 transplanting, as described in Chapter V using the "raised bed" 

 or the "depressed bed," etc., according to the expectation of more 

 or less moisture following the seed sowing, and all the suggestions 

 for open air seed starting given earlier in this chapter are also ap- 

 plicable. Of course, also, many plants removed in thinning the stand- 

 ing rows can be used in transplanting for additional areas of the 



