Part II.] STORAGE OF FAR:\I PRODUCTS. 141 



Handle with Care. 

 All fruits should be handled like eggs, and in preparing fruit 

 for storage all that is bruised or damaged should be discarded. 

 Windfalls should be sold for what they will bring. Pouring 

 fruit into barrels is likely to bruise or injure some of it, and all 

 such injuries impair the keeping qualities. Some vegetables are 

 equally fragile. The shells of squashes and the stem ends are 

 readily injured, and such specimens are likely to rot; therefore 

 care should be used in handling. 



Squashes and Pumpkins. 

 Squashes and pumpkins should be stored in a comparatively 

 warm, dry atmosphere. They will keep well at a temperature 

 of 40° to 50° F. When placed in open crates in some upper 

 room near the chimney they ought to keep well if a continuous 

 fire keeps the chimney warm. Squashes, pumpkins and sweet 

 potatoes will do well often near a furnace room in the cellar, 

 but not in cool, moist cellars. 



Parsnips, Salsify and Horse Radish. 

 These may be left over winter in the ground where they grew, 

 as freezing does not injure them and actually improves the 

 tenderness and flavor of parsnips. It may be more convenient, 

 however, to dig them and place them in piles on the ground, 

 covering them with 6 inches of soil. 



Cabbage. 

 For early winter use cabbages may be stored in the cellar by 

 packing in barrels of sand. For later use they may be placed 

 in outdoor pits or trenches. Cabbages can be kept perfectly in 

 dry soil. Some place them heads downward; others reverse the 

 order. They are kept commonly by standing them on their 

 heads on the surface of the ground and banking them up with 

 earth. They are placed in long rows three heads in width. 

 Three heads are placed side by side and two more on these, 

 and earth is filled in so that the roots barely appear at the 

 surface. They are thus stored with the leaves intact. 



