CULTURE OF THE CAULTFLOWER AND CABBAGE. 21 



varieties vary in hardiness, and when it is desired to produce young- 

 plants for a succession of crops. For an early spring crop of 

 cauliflowers and cabbages, the plants must be brought into condition 

 for planting out as early as the weather will permit ; and for all 

 planting the plants require suitable age, which cannot be acquired 

 in only a week or two, though they might be forced into suitable 

 size, but there is a certain quality they acquire in no other way 

 than by age. For late planting and crops, the plants are grown 

 in the open ground. In describing the culture of the cauliflower 

 and the cabbage it will be unnecessary to enter into details ; any 

 little modification of these can readily be made to suit varied 

 circumstances of different varieties. 



As before remarked, a first and most important essential in 

 growing the plants, is seed, intre pedigree seed, sound and tme. 

 If plants are not produced from the best of seed, no after culture 

 will compensate therefor, and first class cauliflowers or cabbages 

 need not be expected. The cauliflower is the most advanced 

 improvement on nature of the cabbage tribe, and unless the best 

 of seed is used it tends strongly to revert ; therefore procure the 

 best seed at any cost rather than accept and use a doubtful article 

 at a reduced price. Many fail here, at the start, from thinking to 

 economize a little. 



Grotving Plants. I will first give directions for growing plants 

 for the later crops in the open ground — the same treatment being 

 alike applicable to the cabbage and the cauliflower. Perhaps I 

 should say that the most thorough course is the best, although 

 requiring some extra labor which may seem to some unnecessary. 



Seed Bed. The soil should be generously rich, deep, and mellow, 

 and be freshly dug and worked to a fine tilth for several inches at 

 the surface ; a sandy loam works the best for a seed bed. Unless 

 the soil is in good heart a liberal dressing of well fined stable 

 manure or guano should be thoroughly intermixed with three or 

 four inches of the surface. When the ground is thoroughly 

 prepared, which should be in May, sow the seed in drills, six inches 

 apart, thinly, compressing the soil over the seed. As soon as the 

 plants show themselves, sow over them a dusting of soot and 

 plaster to keep off the fly, and thin them, when second leaves are 

 made, to two or three inches in a row. When the plants have 

 made leaves as wide as an old copper cent, transplant into another 

 bed of finely worked rich soil, freshly dug, six inches apart. 



