1880 



GLEANIA'GJS IN UEE CULTURE. 



137 



Avay ill larger boxes, or in llie open ground. 

 I3y this time, lake every oUier mesh of the 

 tmnsplanting-frame, and, it' you choose, 

 every other row in the meshes, according to 

 the size of the plants and their liabits. 



AVe work in this way, cabbage, caiditlower, 

 kale, lettuce, celery, and tomatoes. Yon 

 will see, we have absolute mathem;itic:il reg- 

 ularity, and with no waste ground. When 

 the weather is suitable to work in the open 

 air, use tlie same frame there. Bat I would 

 have all my plant-beds, outdoors as well as 

 in the greenhouse, m ide of very deep j'ich 

 soil; and if it is soil that will bake over, put 

 on enough peat to cover the surface— at least, 

 to do entirely away Avitli baking. AVe can 

 not tolerate a hard crust around our ]>lants, 

 nor over our seeds. Your plants will be all 

 the better and all the stronger if they are 

 transplanted 1v:icc before they are put out in 

 the field. 



Some may ask. '• Why this laborious trans- 

 ])lanting?" Several things are accomplished 

 by it. First, Ave get a stronger librous root 

 than can be secured well otherwise. Second, 

 we economize space. In one of the boxes I 

 have described, you can keep about L'COO lit- 

 tle plants until they are two or three weeks 

 old. AV' hen transplanted by the frame, these 

 same l)Oxes will hold about 110 plants each. 

 They can stand in this box until they are 

 ready to go into the open ground, as a rule. 

 AVith celery, and some other plants having a 

 great mass of tibrous roots, we can, when 

 the time comes to transplant for the field, 

 turn out the contents into one fibrous sod of 

 matted roots and soil. This sod may be 

 handled as you would handle ;i door-mat. 

 Lay it on a smooth board (such as a hive-cov- 

 er, for instance), and take a long butcher- 

 knife and slice the plants up into little 

 squares— or, rather, little hexagons. Each 

 one looks like a potted strawben-y-plant, and 

 you can plant it out in good soil, and have 

 it grow without a single failure of a plant, or 

 any pheck, by transplanting. The AVliite- 

 Plume celery that we have been selling for 

 six months at such good prices was all 

 raised and transplanted in this way. A good 

 hand will transplant oOU seedlings into boxes 

 in an hour ; and where the soil is just right, 

 he can put nearly as many in the open ground; 

 so you see that transplanting is not such very 

 expensive business, after all. In the green- 

 house, you have your box on a table of the 

 right height, so it is not n/^arly as fatiguing 

 HS working on your knees in the open air. 

 yhe third reason in favor of transplanting 



over sowing the seed is, that in transplant- 

 ing you get the plant Avhere it ought to be, 

 and no failures; Avhereas, if you sow tlie 

 seed this would be n?xt to impossible, with- 

 out a very expensive thinning-out. Last, 

 but not least, we get our plants large and 

 strongly rooted, in full vigor, and ready to 

 go into the ground the very day some other 

 crop has been marketed and sold. We also 

 have the plant prepared to take right hold 

 on the manure— that is. you need not pur- 

 chase your manure, if you have to buy it, 

 until the plants are ready to take right hold 

 of it. You see, you have the use of your 

 money longer. 



FILLING IN WHERE TAUT OF A UROI' HAS 

 FAILED. 



For a good many years I have been in the 

 habit of planting over where tlie seeds did 

 not come up. Sometimes we plant corn 

 again where a hill has failed ; at other times 

 we put in a c:ibb:ige or tomato plant. Later 

 in the £ei;son, white beans, etc. Now, I 

 have come to the conclusion lately, that I 

 want no moie mixing up, if it can possibly 

 be avoided. Suppose we have an order for 

 green corn, when the crop is about exhaust- 

 ed. I tell the boys they can get some nice 

 corn by hiuiting up the hi'.ls that are planted 

 a second time; bat the job of hunting is 

 more than the com is worth. Going over 

 the held for hsre and there a few tomatoes, 

 is about as bad ; ar.d even going over the 

 farm to gather the white beans that have 

 been put in waste places is a good deal the 

 same way. The boy who ;is sent gets only 

 about half of them. I tell him to go out 

 again, and then lind a lot missed. I want, if 

 possible, the whole ground occupied with one 

 crop, and I want that crop to ripen all at 

 once, as far as possible. AVhen it is all ripe. 

 I want to be able to clean the ground and 

 prepare it for another crop, and soon; and 

 in no other way can this be done so well as 

 by transplanting— that is, such plants as are 

 usually Avorked in that way. Last season I 

 transplanted corn and cucumbers, and made 

 a success of it too. In this way I had no va- 

 cant hills, and yet my plants were all of one 

 age. AVith the cucumbers we dug a good- 

 sized hole, then divided the hill with a spade 

 while another hand with a shovel cut under 

 so as to take a large shovelful of dirt, plants 

 and all. Scarcely one of the transplanted 

 hills wilted where it was done carefully. Of 

 course, this will pay only with crops such a§ 

 market garcjeners raise. 



