Vegetable Growing 93' 



have, then, practically a continuous planting and harvesting season. 

 There is, however, a division possible to make in this way: Plant- 

 ings undertaken in September and October are for winter supplies 

 of new potatoes, which begin about the holidays and continue during 

 the winter. There is also in southern California a planting beginning 

 in January, which might be called the earliest planting for the main 

 crop, and other plantings for the main crop in the central and north- 

 ern parts of the State begin in February and continue until May, 

 according to the character of the land; that is, whether it is upland, 

 on which the planting is earlier, or whether it is lowland along the 

 rivers where excessive moisture mav render the land unsuitable until 

 April or May. The harvesting of the main crop then begins in May 

 and continues during the whole of the summer, according to the 

 character of the land cropped over, lapping the planting time for 

 early potatoes first mentioned. It is also true by use of properly 

 matured seed one can secure, in some places, two crops a year, if 

 there is sufficient inducement therefor. Thus it comes about that 

 we are continually planting and digging potatoes according to local 

 conditions and the possibility of selling advantages. 



Keeping Potatoes. 



Advise me hozv to keep my potatoes. What is the best tuayf Would 

 a dark room be suitable? Soine people are digging holes in the ground 

 to put them in. 



Potatoes, if properly matured and free from disease, will keep 

 for a considerable time in dark rooms kept as cool as possible. They 

 must be kept away from the reach of the moth, which is parent to 

 the worm producing long black strings inside of the potato. If they 

 are thoroughly covered with boards or sacking or straw, so as to 

 keep the moth from reaching the potato, they may be held for a 

 long time in the open air, and covering with earth, as your neighbors 

 are doing, will be all right until the rains come and cause decay by 

 making the soil too wet. The main point is to keep the tubers as 

 cool as possible and out of reach of the potato moth. 



Potato Yield. 



What is the yield per acre of potatoes on the best land around Stock- 

 ton, Cal., where zvork is done properly; also ivhat is the yield for pota- 

 toes along the coast? 



The average yield of potatoes in California, taking the whole 

 acreage and product as reported by the last United States census, 

 is 147 bushels to the acre. In Stockton district, on good new re- 

 claimed land the yield has been reported all the way from 300 to 800 

 bushels per acre — the crop declining raoidly when continued on the 

 same land. One year's crop in the Stockton district was estimated 

 at 45,000 acres averaging 125 sacks per acre. The coast yield would 

 be more like the general average for the State as first given. 



