20 BULLETIN 159, U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 



While the Sassafras sand does not constitute a valuable soil for 

 the production of the usual grain and hay crops, its warm, porous 

 condition renders it an especially valuable soil for the growing of 

 the special vegetable and small fruit crops. 



Large areas of the type on western Long Island are located so 

 close to New York City; other areas in central and southern New 

 Jersey are so favorably situated near the Camden and Philadelphia 

 markets; and even some areas in Maryland, located near to Balti- 

 more, are so accessible to city markets that a considerable use is 

 made of them in the production of small fruit and vegetables. 



For the purposes of the market gardener and the trucker the 

 Sassafras sand is a very valuable soil. Because of its coarse texture 

 and through natural drainage, it is a warm, early soil, which may 

 be worked at an early date in the spring and which forces the vege- 

 tables and fruits to a rapid growth and an early maturity. When 

 heavily manured and properly managed, it gives satisfactory yields 

 of a considerable number of such special crops. The type is recog- 

 nized through extensive experience as one of the most desirable 

 soils of the North Atlantic coast region for trucking and market 

 gardening. 



Added to the warm, well-drained character of the soil and the 

 location of important areas of it near to market and to favorable 

 transportation facilities is the fact that it lies at low elevations, 

 and frequently within the protective climatic influences of large 

 bodies of tidewater. This is the case with the areas found upon 

 western Long Island ; it is generally true of the most important areas 

 in New Jersey; and it also applies to the areas of the type found 

 near Baltimore, Md. These circumstances give rise to availability 

 for crop uses early in the spring and to a lengthening of the grow- 

 ing season to such an extent that two or more crops are produced in 

 one season from the same ground. 



The vegetable crops grown upon the Sassafras sand frequently 

 reach maturity at a date from four days to one week in advance of 

 the same crops from the same localities grown upon other finer- 

 grained and more retentive soils. 



The Sassafras sand occupies the same relative position as an early 

 truck crop soil in the northern Atlantic Coastal Plain that the Nor- 

 folk sand occupies in localities farther south. Both are the earliest 

 soils of their respective regions. 



A bewildering variety of vegetable crops is grown in rapid suc- 

 cession upon the Sassafras sand in all of the developed trucking 

 sections of Long Island and southern New Jersey. No census sta- 

 tistics are available to give definite acreages of the different crops. 

 In general it may be stated that early Irish potatoes, tomatoes, and 

 sweet potatoes occupy the largest areas among these crops. 



