BRUSSELS SPROUTS* 



Brussels sprouts are grown throughout the eastern end of Long 

 Island, covering much the same section as cauliflower; but the in- 

 dustry is centered about Orient, at the extreme end of the Island. 

 Cauliflower was once largely planted near Orient, and the soil 

 appears to be quite as well adapted to the crop as farther west; 

 but it has proved impossible, perhaps because of fogs, to grow as 

 good cauliflowers here as about Southold and to the west, hence 

 the growers have abandoned this crop for sprouts. Equally good 

 sprouts can be raised west of Southold, but cauliflowers are deemed 

 more profitable, and the industry is better organized. 



Sprouts are grown on the same soils and sites as cauliflower, and 

 for discussion of these topics the reader is referred to the pre- 

 ceding article on Cauliflower. 



HISTORY 



The first sprout seed sown in Orient was brought there by 

 Captain Smith Dewey, a commission man who was a regular buyer 

 at the east end of the Island, from New York in 1876. He se- 

 cured an ounce of seed imported from Belgium by Mr. W. G. 

 Ihrig, a New York commission man, and divided it equally be- 

 tween Mr. George W. Hallock and Mr. John Henry Youngs. 

 Mr. Hallock discontinued the crop after one year, but Mr. Youngs 

 has grown it uninterruptedly to the present time, though continu- 

 ous and careful selection has so improved the stock that it now 

 has little resemblance to the original. 



The plants first raised were about three feet in height, or nearly 

 twice that of the present strain, and had larger, though very firm, 

 sprouts. It was customary in the early days to plant sprouts early, 

 and this no doubt partly accounts for the difference in height. 



Brussels sprouts were all but unknown on the New York market 

 in the seventies, and Mr. Ihrig, who handled the slender Long 

 Island product, found it slow work to build up a trade in them. 

 Among his best customers in those days w r ere Tom Thumb and 

 his wife of Bar-num's Museum, at Ann Street and Broadway, 



* Reprint from Cornell Experiment Station Bulletin "No. 292. 



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