Vegetable Growing 87 



Handling Winter Melons. 



Give particulars regarding harvesting, storaging, and shipment of 

 winter melons. How do you harvest and pack them for distant market? 



There is no particular system in the liandling of winter melons. 

 They are gathered into piles on ground where water will not gather 

 and covered with the trash of the vines on which they grow. They 

 will keep for months in this way, as our autumn temperatures do 

 not freeze them. Other growers collect them in open sheds shaded 

 from sun and rain, and still others put them into barns or shallow 

 cellars under buildings, etc. The melons are very durable and seem 

 disposed to keep in any old way. The melons are shipped in large 

 packing cases with slat sides, or in the smaller slat crates that are 

 used for summer cantaloupes. No packing is used, generally. If 

 it seemed necessary, a little clean straw would be sufficient. 



Ripe Melons. 



How can I tell zvhen a watermelon is fully ripef What is the method 

 used by growers in picking for commercial shipping f 



Gently press the sides of a melon and if it crackles a little bit, 

 all right ; if it makes no sound then go to another. Commercial 

 pickers look at the little spiral between the melon and the nearest 

 leaf. If it is withered they pick the melon, if fresh, pass it until 

 next picking. 



Growing Onion Seed and Sets. 



Will you give localities of the leading production of onion seed or 

 dry sets in your State? 



Onion seed is grown in several parts of the State, largely in the 

 Santa Clara valley adjacent to the city of San Jose. Onion sets are 

 largely produced in Orange county, near Los Angeles, for eastern 

 shipment, for which purpose they are grown under contract. 



Ripening Onions. 



/ am raising some onions from bottom sets and as they are growing 

 nicely and are beginning to swell at the bulb some advise me to cut the 

 tops off and some advise me to bend them over or tramp them doivn. 



Do not cut ofif the tops of the onions. If they seem to be over- 

 growing and not disposed to ripen the bulb, the top can be broken 

 down, thus partly arresting the vegetative energy of the plant and 

 causing maturity. 



Onions from Sets. 



Will onion sets planted in July grozv and mature in the fall months? 



Good onion sets grown during the winter and spring should be 

 mature by July and if planted after drying would proceed to make 

 a full growth of large onions if growing conditions should be right 

 for them; that is, the soil moist and the temperature not too high. 



