22 



BULLETIN" 527, U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 



Fig. 2S.— Flat, 



gardener removes a quantity of plants from the hotbed to a warm 

 room and transplants them to the flats. The flats with the newly 

 planted seedlings in them are then placed in the cold frames. Later 

 they may be transplanted to the soil of the cold frame or to the 

 field direct. 



Flats vary considerably in size. Perhaps the most common sizes 

 are 20 to 24 inches in length, and 15 to 16 inches in width; 2\ inches 

 is the usual depth. The ends are in most cases made of ir-inch 



material and the sides and bottom of ^-inch 

 material. Cracks J inch in width are left 

 in the bottom to provide for drainage. 



Figure 28 shows a flat 24 by 16 by 2\ 

 inches inside measurement. Make several 

 flats of this or any other convenient size, using |-inch material for 

 the ends and ^-inch material for the sides and bottom. Leave |-inch 

 cracks in the bottom. From the experience you have had in previous 

 exercises you will be able to construct them without having the de- 

 tailed instructions before you. Make out a bill of materials, a bill 

 of stock, cut the pieces, square them up, and assemble them. 



Inexpensive flats are often made by gardeners from soap or other 

 similar boxes by sawing the box into sections about 2\ inches in 

 depth and nailing strips on these sections to form bottoms for the 

 flats. Figure 29 shows how to mark out the box for sawing it into 

 sections. Get a box and some pieces of |-inch strips for bottoms 

 and make a few flats in this way. If the 

 box has a bottom and a cover on it, you 

 can use these for the bottoms of two of 

 the flats. 



Note to Teacher. — Flats should be found in every 

 school where agriculture is taught. They may be 

 used in connection with a hotbed and cold frame as 

 described previously or be placed in sunny windows 

 in the schoolhouse. Plants for study during the 

 winter or for transplanting to the garden to secure 

 early crops are often grown successfully in flats in 

 schoolhouses. A shelf wide enough for the flats is built on a level with the window sill 



Fig. 29.— Method of marking box 

 for sawing into fiats. 



EXERCISE IX. FORCING BOX. 



A very practical piece of equipment for use in forcing the growth 

 of rhubarb and asparagus in the early spring is shown in figure 30. 

 One of these boxes is placed over a clump of rhubarb or asparagus 

 late in the fall or early in the spring, and barnyard manure is filled in 

 around the box. The heat from the manure and from the sun's rays 

 through the glass cover warms the soil under the box, and as a result 

 the plants start to grow earlier. Often plants can be forced to pro- 



