I3d 



GLliA.NLXGS IM UEk CULTURE. 



Fei$. 



then, in view of tlie expense of tlie space it 

 occupied, I would liave them at exact dis- 

 tances. Do you say, " This mathematical 

 accuracy is all very well to talk about, but it 

 won't pay in practice '"V Just wait a bit. 1 

 suppose most of my readers are familiar 

 with the quincunx plan of planting fruit- 

 trees and other things where we want to get 

 as much room as possible for each pla«t, and 

 still have the ground all covered. It is 

 simply adopting the plan the bees use 

 in building their cells. Where an orchard 

 is planted with the trees in squares, there is 

 quite a space in the center of each square, 

 comparatively unoccupied. Fruit - growers 

 sometimes put a peach-tree in this center. 

 A much more economical way is the plan of 

 which I have spoken. It is, to have each 

 plant or tree the center of six, and the six 

 are at exact distances from each other. The 

 cut below, taken from our A B C book, will 

 explain this, only that was made lor bee- 



M 



Jiives and grapevine trellises. You can sup- 

 pose each hive to be a cabbage-plant. The 

 cabbage-plant sends out its leaves, usually, 

 in pretty nearly a circle. AVhen they get so 

 they crowd each other, these circles will so 

 adapt themselves as to pretty nearly cover 

 the ground ; each one being squeezed a little 

 against its neighbor, would give exactly the 

 form of a cell of a honey-comb. 



How shall we get our plants set like this 

 without too much expense? Well, the plan 

 of sowing things in drills, if the plants 

 could be made to " break joinls."' as it were, 

 would accomplish it ; but even if they do 

 not break joints, it is, I think, as a general 

 thing, rather ahead of the hill system, un- 

 less, indeed, we have a wire-check rower to 

 place the hills so they break joints exactly, 

 and make a corn-field look like the above 

 figure. Then I should want seel enough 

 put in so that each hill can have exactly the 

 right number of stalks and no more. There 



is probably no tnethod of accomplishing this 

 latter, except thinning. In Setting out 

 plants, however, we can do it just as well as 

 not ; in fact, with the little device figured 

 below, and which is, so far as I know, my 

 own invention, we can do it better than not. 



TRANSPLANTING-FRAME. 



The above is made by stretching a piece of 

 poultry-netting over a frame of half -inch 

 iron. I would have this frame made of iron 

 instead of loood, because iron, by its weight, 

 stays right where it is laid, and is not easily 

 moved around, even if you hit it with your 

 hand while transplanting. You see, if you 

 should give it a hitch after a part of your 

 plants are put in, it might be difficult to get 

 it back into its place again, and this would 

 spoil the symmetry of your rows: In use it 

 will pay, perhaps, to have two sizes of these 

 frames. One of them is two feet wide, and 

 just long enough to lay inside the side-boards 

 of the benches in our greenhouse. The oth- 

 er just drops inside the boxes we pictured on 

 page ()0. 



Now, then, when your seedlings, such as 

 we told you how to grow in the chapter be^ 

 fore this, have got so far as to show the third 

 leaf , and begin to look somewhat crowded, 

 take them up with the fibrous moss, or peat", 

 I have described, adhering to the'little root- 

 lets, and plant each one in the center of one 

 of the meshes of the frame. Our method of 

 transplanting is to take a little wooden stick, 

 the size of a lead-pencil, or a little larger. 

 Instead of having the end of the stick a sharp 

 pouit, however, let it be flattened so as to be 

 perhaps a fourth of an inch wide at the point. 

 Lay the plant in the center of one of the 

 meshes, and with this flattened point of wood 

 push it clear down to the first leaves, then 

 with the same stick press the soil around it. 

 When you finish the box, take a watering- 

 pot with fine a rose and soak the soil so as 

 to have it settle all about the little rootlets. 

 If you do your work well, not one in the box 

 should fail. The soil to be put in these 

 boxes to start the little plants, should be 

 much like that prepared for the seeds. An 

 inch of fine old manure in the bottom of the 

 box will be quite a help. When they get too 

 much crowded, plant them out in the same 



