128 THE NEW RHUBARB CULTURE. 



is porliaps the most coiiuiioii and most serious mistake. 

 4x4 feet is plenty close enough. 



^o great profits without lavish manuring. Ten cords 

 of the average manure is about what the large growers 

 expect to use every year on good land : 25 to 50 big loads 

 will be somewhere near right. Some find it pays them 

 to use more. N'obody should start a large field of this 

 hungry vegetable, who is not able and willing to get 

 as mucli manure as it needs. 



For handling roots use a long handle spade, a round- 

 cornered shovel and a wide, flat-pointed crowbar. This 

 outfit will make it easy to dig roots for new plantings. 



Large growers make considerable money selling roots 

 for planting, at $7 to $15 per 100. Roots are shipped 

 in barrels or boxes, packed in moss or cut straw. 



The very earliest crops are on light soils fertilized 

 abundantly witJi manure and nitrate of soda and well 

 soaked in a dry time with artificial water supply. 



Rhubarb is such a rank feeder that nothing comes 

 amiss. Small animals which are found dead on the 

 farm are best disposed of by burying near the rhubarb 

 hills. No injury results to the plants, and if so treated 

 they produce enormous stalks. 



Cultivation is very easy because the great leaves 

 shade the ground and choke out weeds, and the same 

 leaves after cutting, if spread along the roots, also assist 

 in keeping down the weeds, so that tlie main thing for 

 cultivation is to keep the ground fairly mellow, and 

 work in whatever manure is applied. 



The plants are hard to kill and stand most any kind 

 of ill treatment when transplanting, but it is best to 

 handle them carefully, and set during a wet time in 

 order not to lose any of the season's growth. 



The great secret of success in raising asparagus and 



