FEBRUARY 1, 1916 



129 



HIGH-PRESSURE GARDENING 



SOME GLIMPSES OF OUR 



FLORIDA HOME AND 



GARDEN. 



When we came here 

 the first week in No- 

 vember I made haste 

 to plant some potatoes. 

 The only good sprout- 

 ed seed to be found on 

 the market was $2.25 

 per bushel. Cut No. 1 

 shows them 40 days 

 after planting. It is 

 now (Dee. 31) about 

 50 days, and some of 

 the hills are 2 feet 

 high, covering the 

 ground. There are a 

 few potatoes already 



nearly the size of small hens' eggs — no 

 bugs, no blight, not even a flea-beetle, to 

 make the leaves full of small holes; in 

 fact, I do not think 1 ever saw perfect 

 potato foliage until I came to Florida. In 

 the background you see one of the mulberry 

 trees I have so often spoken of; also a 

 banana, slightly touched by the frost — the 

 one or two that we have had, but none so 

 far to hurt anything except sweet pota- 

 toes.* 



Fig. 



* At the left of the house in the background is 

 the great rubber tree. Three years ago last June it 

 was just coming out of the ground; now it is 20 

 feet high and 50 feet wide in its spread of branches. 

 Mrs. Root says I shall have to move the house or 

 the tree. 



1.— Red Bliss Triumph potatoes planted Nov. 11. 

 Photographed 40 days later. 



Cut No. 2 shows another bed of potatoes 

 about 30 days after planting. Thru the 

 center of the bed is a row of loquat plums, 

 set out only a year ago, but all containing 

 more or less bloom. On the left is a clump 

 of the roselle bushes I have written about. 

 The foliage has dropped off, but the "fruit" 

 is still good. We are having it every day 

 with cut-up oranges. Just behind them is 

 an orange-tree full of fruit. 



Cut No. 4 is my favorite Royal grape- 

 fruit, still bending with its load of fruit in 

 spite of the fact that one or more are taken 

 every day for my " fruit supper " with a 

 couple of apples brought from Ohio. 



Fig. 2. — Bliss Triumph potatoes 30 days after planting. 



