24 MARKET-GARDENING WITH KITCHEN VEGETABLES. 



second-crop potatoes till time to set lettuce again. In this way the 

 soil is kept growing something every day in the year, and as this 

 intensive work costs heavily to prepare the frames and to manure as. 

 heavily as this sort of cropping requires, so the profits are corre- 

 spondingly larger than the more extensive work of the open field, 

 and it is not rare to get $3,000 an acre from the winter lettuce- 

 growing. 



KALE AND SPINACH. 



These are sown in the early fall for shipment as greens during the 

 winter and early spring. A very severe winter North which kills 

 these crops there will at times make the kale and spinach crops very 

 profitable. Kale, being the hardier and more productive, sells for a 

 lower price than spinach, but as both are cheaply grown and only 

 occupy the land during the cool season, and enable the trucker to 

 keep some hands at work ready for the spring and to take care of the 

 lettuce frames, the greens crop is usually fairly profitable, and some 

 think that in seasons when the shipping is not profitable it pays to 

 grow these crops merely to turn under in the spring. 



STRING-BEANS OR SNAPS. 



These are very largely grown by the market-gardeners, and, when 

 early, they pay very well, as they are cheaply grown, need light fer- 

 tilization and are out of the way in early summer, so that a hay crop 

 of peas and crab-grass can be grown on the same land, the dead bean 

 tops helping to fertilize the land. Muskmelons are sometimes planted 

 between the rows in alternate rows and the bean vines turned under 

 for their benefit after the beans are shipped, and these followed by a 

 volunteer crop of crab-grass hay or by the second crop of Irish pota- 

 toes, for no market-gardener is satisfied with less than two crops 

 annually on his land, and often gets three or four, for the second-crop 

 Irish potatoes can be at once followed by the early cabbage crop from 

 plants set in December. 



ENGLISH PEAS. 



The early crop of English peas is a very important one to the 

 market-gardener in eastern North Carolina. The main crop of the 

 extra earlies is usually sown in January and goes to market late in 

 April and early May. Single growers will often plant a hundred 

 acres in peas. They are a cheaply-grown crop and are soon off the 

 land, and the vines turned under are valuable for the improvement 

 of the soil and can at once be followed by some later crop, such as 

 cucumbers or melons. 



CELERY. 



This crop is not as yet very largely grown in the eastern trucking 

 section, but it can be made a very profitable crop on the peaty re- 



