After the seed has been sown and the earth above 

 has been well firmed, no watering will be necessary until 

 the seedlings appear, unless the soil was too dry to begin 

 with. In that case, water as freely as necessary ; there is 

 little danger of applying too much. The seedlings should 

 appear in four or five days, and a week or ten days later 

 they may be thinned. The small kinds will do well if two 

 or three are left to the inch ; the large ones require more 

 room, and one plant to about an inch of space will be 

 found none too thin. When this work has been done, 

 nearly all the further attention necessary will be to main- 

 tain a proper temperature and to apply water when it is 

 needed. Weeding, and an occasional cultivation with a 

 hand weeder, should not be neglected. 



As has already been said, the successful forcing of 

 radishes is not such an easy matter as it would at first 

 appear. The more important of the difficulties will now 

 be considered in detail. 



The conditions found in a hotbed which is almost 

 spent are very nearly ideal for forcing radishes. In the 

 first place, the temperatures of the soil and the air under 

 the glass are as nearly right as they can well be made. 

 As a rule, the radish is believed to do best in a cool 

 house, one having a temperature of 4o-6o.* The soil 

 in such a house should not be much warmer. But in a 

 hotbed it is warmer, and frequently very much warmer. 

 This explains the rapid and luxuriant growth which may 

 be produced apparently without effort on the part of the 



*"It adapts its?lf to hotbeds and forcing-houses quite well, but it 

 objects to an overheated forcing-house as much as to an excessively 

 exposed coldframe. It grows too many leaves and becomes pithy in 

 one situation, and in the other case its growth is stunted or 

 wholly checked, and under severe freezing it dies. Its proper tem- 

 perature is from 40 to 65, with plenty of fresh air. In rich soil, with 

 sufficient water, it is a quick cropper, sometimes being ready for 

 market in 21 days from the seed." * * * " The wholesale market 

 price of radishes at Philadelphia in winter maybe quoted at $2 to $4 

 per 100 bunches." Dreer's Vegetables Under Glass," 57, 59. 



