122 CALIFORNIA VEGETABLES 



screen is suggested, providing the ground is kept rich and well 

 cultivated. A row of the plants along an irrigating ditch is usually 

 very desirable, both for use and beauty. 



In commercial planting on the seashore slopes and flats it has 

 been desirable to give the plants very wide distances. Speaking of 

 the practice in San Mateo county, Mr. Parker says : 



About 900 plants are figured to the acre. On level ground they are set 

 six feet apart with ten feet spaces between rows. This gives ample space for 

 wagons, cultivators, and small irrigation ditches. On many of the farms they 

 raise peas, corn, beans, and tomatoes between the rows. Where ground is 

 high and the irrigation ditches have to be deep, the artichokes are planted on 

 each side of the ditch so that there is sometimes fully thirty feet space between 

 the canals. 



Gathering. The flower buds should be removed as soon as 

 they are well formed and before the scales open. In this condition 

 they are more tender and a larger portion of the scale is edible. 

 As the bud stands at the apex of the shoot, the shoot should be cut 

 to the ground. If this is done the plant is induced to send up more 

 shoots. As soon as the flowers are allowed to open, the growth of 

 shoots from below is checked or stopped. Hence prompt cutting 

 as soon as in condition insures a larger bearing season, but as other 

 vegetables come into condition, the plants should be allowed to 

 make free top growth for the reinforcement of the roots for the 

 next season. 



Of the way a commercial plantation can be made to deliver its 

 product in the winter when demand is best, Mr. Parker says : 



The plants are cut down to the ground during June and July. The new 

 shoots will not bear until September or October, the top buds first ; and cut- 

 ting these off causes new buds continually to be sent out. This continues dur- 

 ing the winter, reaching the maximum yield in January. In the following 

 May no more buds are cut off, but are allowed to bloom. The later the cutting 

 down of the plant, the larger the buds will be the next winter. When the 

 plants are cut back too early in June, the buds will appear very early but they 

 are always small. 



Variety. The variety chiefly grown in California is the Large 

 Green Paris, a vigorous grower yielding buds of large size with 

 scales very fleshy at the base and set in a broad receptacle also 

 fleshy. This variety grown for succession seems to leave little op- 

 portunity for the use of other varieties. 



It is very necessary that discrimination should be made against 

 poor plants which have loose bud-formation and a spiny growth. 

 They should be extirpated. 



THE CARDOON. 



The cardoon is closely related to the globe artichoke, and re- 

 sembles it in growth except that it attains larger size. Its edible 

 part is, however, the stem and midrib of the leaf, and not the flower 

 bud as in the artichoke. It is propagated from seed and not from 



