34 



THE VEGETABLES OF NEW YORK 



and with peas of fair quality altho those of most of the 

 strains of Strawberry were inferior. References do not 

 prove definitely that the name Tom Thumb was used 

 for this or other strains of Strawberry before the stocks 

 and name came from England; but rural periodicals, 

 during the decade of the Civil War. wire filled with 

 assertions and denials of the identity of the " American 

 Tom Thumb " with Beck Gem and the English Tom 

 Thumb, and of the two latter with each other. 



The two strains coming from England, under the 

 influence of the hotter, drier days of our pea season 

 became still further reduced in height and advanced in 

 earliness. These strains undoubtedly became mixed, 

 or confused, with strains of Strawberry, including the 

 American Tom Thumb, and Barr Tom Thumb; and 

 seed stocks of the American strains were, according to 

 Burr, sent to England, crops grown there, and seed 

 reimported to America. From this confusion, Tom 

 Thumb became the group name of many strains of 

 peas, all with more or less dwarf plants, stocky -stemmed, 

 short-jointed, usually branched but sometimes not, 

 second early, with small, dark green foliage, and fairly 

 large, straight or very slightly curved, rounded to blunt 

 ended pods, which contained small, round, cream 

 colored or yellowish seeds. Several peas of the same or 

 very similar characteristics have been developed in 

 France, Germany and Holland, and names of these 

 have been given by writers on the pea as synonyms of 

 Tom Thumb. 



Prof. Goff. in 1884, described Tom Thumb. 



Height 1 ' j to 2 feet but many strains much more dwarf; stem 

 strong, much branched, with short internodes; foliage abundant, very 

 compact, rather deep green, neither glaucous nor whitened, with 

 upper leaflets smaller; peduncles 1 to 2 inches long: pods paired, 

 lighter colored than foliage, 2 to 2 ] 2 inches by ! ■> inch; peas 4 to 

 6, whitish green, compressed when full grown, about :! * inch longest 

 diameter; seeds cream colored, roundish, very smooth, ' ( inch in 

 diameter, with radicle showing distinctly, and weighing about 117 

 to the ounce. It was prolific, rather early, and ripening over a 

 long season. 



In England Carter's Improved Tom Thumb and 

 Sutton's Long-podded Tom Thumb were found in trials 

 of the Royal Horticultural Society, late in the " 60's," 

 to be no improvement over the original Paul's Tom 

 Thumb. In America, however, an Improved Tom 

 Thumb, introduced about 1885 by Gregory, had con- 

 siderably taller vines, was much more productive than 

 the common strains, a few days later, with larger, 

 better filled pods, resembling those of the old Bishop 

 Dwarf; that is, longer, tapering for one-third length, 

 then rather broad to tip. 



Tom Thumb as grown at Geneva 3 years: Plant 10 to 15 

 inches tall; stem stout, erect, oval to angular, smooth, with very 

 short internodes and a few basal branches; foliage abundant, dark 

 green, very slightly glaucous, with 2-4 medium sized rather broad 

 leaflets, and much larger, lightly clasping, slightly whitened stipules 

 rounded at the tips, and bearing a few irregular teeth toward base; 

 Dowers from 7th or 8th node, numerous, medium to large, white; 

 pods usually single, occasionally in pairs, on long, rather thick 

 stalks: 1 ' •_> to 2 inches long, narrow, plump, smooth, round, slightly 

 curved, regular, filled to edge but often not to tip, end blunt to 

 square when well filled, sometimes with short straight tip, some- 

 times without, lighter in color than foliage: peas 5 6, uniform, 

 whitish green to light green, smooth to slightly indented, oval; of 

 poor quality, being starchy, dry and rather tasteless; seeds smooth, 

 round, medium to small (135-145 to ounce i, grayish or bluish 

 cream, sometimes tinged green, cotyledons light yellow to light 

 orange; radicle moderately distinct. When sown early ripens in 

 56 to 60 days, cropping 18 to 21 days; fairly productive, or 

 even good yielder for so small plants. Can be grown in rows 

 10 to 12 inches apart. Does best on heavy soils and reported well 

 adapted for winter sowing in south; but in New York too poor 

 yielder and peas of too poor quality to permit recommendation. 

 Improved Tom Thumb is also still cataloged and grown, tho not 

 extensively. 



Bishop Long-Pod. Rtfs. 31-35; Mcintosh Bk. 

 Gard. 2:55. 1855; Hovey Cat. 1859; Burr Fid. Gard. 

 Veg. 523. 1863; Thompson Card. Asst. 319. 1859. 

 This pea, known in England before 1850 and command- 

 ing favor for a long time, originated, according to 

 Thompson, with David Bishop, as a cross between 

 Bishop Dwarf and a marrow pea. It was soon tested 

 by the Horticultural Society of London and found much 

 superior to Bishop's older pea; and this view was sus- 

 tained by later trials by the Society and in this country. 

 It came here within a decade of its origin and was still 

 grown in America at least as late as 1902. 



It was tested and described at this Station in 1884, 

 and again in 1926, the latter under its French synonym, 

 from seeds grown by the U. S. Department of Agri- 

 culture at McMillan, Mich., which probably traced quite 

 directly to France. The differences in the variety, 

 grown more than 40 years apart, were surprisingly 

 few, the most noticeable being a decrease in length and 

 width of the pods in the late test with an increase in 

 plumpness. 



In this test the plants were 2 feet tall, branched at the base, 

 with dense, medium green foliage, slightly whitened, generally 

 paired pods, borne on 7th to 9th node, ready as second early, 

 lighter in color than the foliage, 23.' 2 ; , inches long, medium to 

 plump, straight, with blunt to square ends, less pointed or rounded 

 than most others in the group, and with 4 to 7 peas in the pod, of 

 medium size, whitish green in color and of fair quality. Now 

 seldom grown either in America or England, but listed in French 

 and German catalogs. 



MARROWFAT GROUP 



The name Marrowfat, as applied in America, refers 

 to an entirely different type of peas from those now 

 known by the name in England, altho the early use of 

 the term was the same in the mother country as on this 

 side of the Atlantic. 



General characters of American Marrowfat 

 peas. — The group here discussed includes, in the main 

 the large, white or yellow, smooth peas used, largely 



in the dry state, for soup-making and cooking or baking 

 with pork or bacon. They are mostly midseason to 

 late, tall and rather heavy in vine, with many branches 

 in the type group, but with none in many allied varieties, 

 bearing the first flowers and pods high up on the stem, 

 the latter usually single on long, thick stalks, broad, 

 square-ended, often becoming quite plump before the 

 peas are of edible size, ordinarily rather few on the vine, 



