50 CELERY CULTURE 



main root of the plant also aids very materially in 

 lifting the plants at planting time. After cutting, 

 the plants should be well watered to prevent their 

 wilting. 



Proper Time to Plant Seed. — From the time the 

 celery seed is sown until the crop is cut for packing, 

 it should be the aim to maintain a steady and 

 healthy growth. The seed-bed should contain suffi- 

 cient available plant food to last throughout the 

 time it is so occupied, and the plants should not 

 receive a shock or rest at any time during their 

 grow^th. When celery plants become overgrown 

 or crowded in the seed-bed, or are allowed to remain 

 too long in the transplanting bed before setting in 

 the field or garden, they will undergo a check or 

 rest that will be liable to cause them to run to seed 

 later. Seed sown too early in the house, greenhouse, 

 or hotbed will produce plants that are liable both 

 to run to seed and to become pithy. In fact any 

 severe check or prolonged period of rest is likely 

 to answer the same purpose in the life history of 

 the plant as wintering over, and it will then produce 

 a seed stalk. 



For the early crop in the North, sow the seeds 

 indoors during the first week of March — the seed- 

 lings should appear by March 20 — transplant to cold- 

 frames or to trays during the first or second week 

 in April, and set in the garden the third week in 

 May. This should produce celery ready for use by 

 the middle of August. For the main or later crop, 

 sow the seeds in cold-frame or protected beds dur- 

 ing the first week of April, transplant during the 



