ONIONS. 163 



mediate shades. In the successful raising of the onion, good 

 judgment and experience plays an important part. Perhaps 

 no vegetable crop is more certain to pay the skilful grower for 

 his time and labor and none more liable to cause trouble to 

 the careless beginner, and yet its cultivation is quite simple. 

 The prices for onions vary greatly. They seldom are so cheap 

 as to make the crop unprofitable: but occasionally they 

 get down to fifteen cents per bushel, at which price they can- 

 not be grown at a profit. There are few animals that eat 

 onions, and if not sold they cannot be fed to stock as is the 

 case with most vegetables. As a money crop for careful 

 growers in many sections they are among the best, and if a 

 reasonable amount of them is raised each year without regard 

 to the price the preceding year, it is a crop that will generally 

 average a good profit. 



Land. Onions may be raised on any good retentive soil. 

 Sandy land is too apt to dry out in summer for best results. 

 On drained muck land, large crops may easily be raised; al- 

 though onions grown on such soil are often a little looser in 

 texture than those raised on drier land. The land should be 

 rich, fine and free from weeds and any strawy manure or other 

 material that would interfere with close cultivation. Too 

 much stress cannot be put on having the land free from 

 weed seeds, since it is a crop that requires much hand weeding 

 and the plants are quite delicate when young. The soil should 

 be rather firm for onions and plowed in the fall rather than in 

 the spring. Fall plowing leaves the soil firm and in excellent 

 condition for this crop. Sometimes when the land is rich it 

 is desirable not to plow at all, especially if it was in onions 

 the preceding year, but instead to make a seed bed by the use 

 of a disk or other good harrow and plant at once; in fact, bet- 

 ter results will generally be obtained from spring harrowing 

 than from spring plowing of land to be used for onions. Of 

 course, if the land is to be harrowed only to prepare it for the 

 crop, it is very important, if manure is to be used, that this 

 be very fine, so that the harrow will cover it. 



Old land is generally preferred for onions, and this 

 crop is often successfully raised on the same land for 

 many years. From the fact that onion land is always most 

 carefully attended to and gets much manure and tillage, it is 



