I0 INTRODUCTORY SUGGESTIONS. 



detached houses. When, however, each house is large 

 enough to completely employ the labor of one or two men, 

 the advantages of the nesting of the houses is not so great ; 

 and it may even be better, in such cases, to have the houses 

 entirely separate, in order to facilitate the hauling of earth 

 and other supplies into them. 



Aside from the labor required to grow the plants, the 

 operator must figure on the cost of the heating. It is imper- 

 ative that the temperatures be kept fairly uniform during the 

 night. In fact, variations of temperature are usually more 

 hurtful at night than at day. For the best results, every 

 forcing establishment should have a night man ; but such a 

 man can not be afforded for a small house. In this case, 

 the gardener must place his dependence upon the self-regu- 

 lating devices of the modern heaters ; but even then he will 

 need to give some attention to his house on very severe 

 nights. Very much depends upon the faithfulness and 

 efficiency of the night man. Very often the owner will find 

 the temperature of the houses to be ideal at bed-time and 

 at 6 in the morning, while, if he had been astir at 4 o'clock, 

 he would have found it ten degrees too low. He would, if 

 he knew the circumstances, cease to wonder why his crops 

 were slow in growth and always attacked by mildew. 



In order to arrive at actual expenditures for heat and 

 labor, I have asked a few of my friends and correspon- 

 dents all wide-awake commercial growers to give me 

 their judgment upon the quantity of coal required to heat 

 for one year a rose house of modern construction, 20 x TOO 

 feet ground surface, even span, 10 ft. high at the ridge. I 

 also asked, "About how large an establishment does it 

 require, in roses or winter tomatoes, to keep one good 

 workman busy during the forcing season, in watering, ven- 

 tilating, training, picking the product, etc. (not attending 

 to the firing)?" The answers to these questions are 

 given belpw. Where the size of the house is not speci- 

 fied, it is understood to be 20 x 100 ft., as stated in the 

 problem. 



