The Care of Growing Crops 203 
Evrie Kilpatrick 
Fic. 119. ‘Thorough and clean culture is the watchword of the successful 
gardener.” Old Farmer’s Almanac 
Weeding. If a garden is properly tilled for maintain- 
ing the surface mulch, weeds never get large enough to 
become a menace, at least between the rows. Weeding, 
therefore, becomes simply the task of pulling by hand 
the weeds that appear close to the growing plants. Such 
weeds should be pulled when they are small, before they 
crowd and shade the growing plants and rob them of water 
and food materials. If for any reason the weeds do be- 
come large, special care should be taken in removing them 
so that the roots of the growing crops are not injured. 
Weeds of large size may be cut off just below the surface. 
The roots of a weed (or of a vegetable that stands 
close beside other plants of the crop) are often much en- 
tangled with the roots of a plant that is near it, and by 
