72 CARROT. 



In September the plants will have attained their full 

 growth and be ready for blanching. This process is best 

 done by tying the leaves together with bast matting or 

 string, then drawing a little earth up to the base of the 

 plant, and then covering it vertically, or thatching it with 

 a thickness of one or two inches of long straw, held in 

 place by proper ties of matting or twine. In about three 

 or four weeks they will be sufficiently blanched to use. 



For a winter supply, the plants may be laid in a trench as 

 directed for celery, or taken up with their roots just before 

 cold weather sets in, and then packed in dry sand, one 

 course above another, in a dry cellar. They will keep well 

 and become more perfectly blanched. 



There are five or six sorts, but for use in this country 

 the Large Smooth is as good as any. 



CARROT. 



The carrot prefers a light, loamy soil, that has been 

 well manured for the previous crops and does not require 

 fresh manure ; for if the soij is too rich, the plants have a 

 tendency to run to leaf and not to form roots, and fresh 

 manure is apt to cause the roots, as it does with all spindle- 

 shaped roots, to become forked and deformed. The soil 

 should be deeply spaded and well pulverized. 



For an early crop, a small bed may be sown in a shel- 

 tered spot as early as the end of March, and from that time 

 until the end of May, at intervals of two weeks, for succes- 

 sion crops. The principal or late crop should not be sown 

 until June. 



For the early crop the drills should be about an inch 

 deep and a foot apart, the plants being thinned out to five 

 or six inches apart on the row, and kept well hoed and 



