FOR THE SOUTHERN STATES. 15 
open ground, towards the end of July and during August, and give them no shade but water, 
and keep the ground moist from the day of sowing till the plants are transplanted. Seeds should 
be sown thinly in the seed bed. If plants come up too thickly they are apt to damp off. 
Lettuce seed should be sprouted during the hot months before sowing, according to direc- 
tions given for June. 
To sow Turnips on a large scale during the late summer and early fall months, the ground 
should be prepared in advance, and the seed sown just before or during rain, Small pieces of 
ground, of course, can be sown at any time and watered afterwards. For covering all kinds of 
seeds, a fork is preferable to a rake; with either implement, care must be taken not to 
cover the seeds too deep. Beans, Peas and Corn are covered with the hoe. Some fine seeds, 
such as Thyme or Tobacco, are covered enough when pressed with the back of the spade to the 
ground. The seedsman is often blamed for selling seeds which have not come up, when the 
same are perfectly good; but, perhaps, through ignorance the party by whom they were sown, 
placed them too deep or too shallow in the ground, or the ground may have been just moist 
enough to swell the seeds, and they failed to come up. At other times washing rains after 
sowing beat the ground and form a crust that the seeds are not able to penetrate, or if there is 
too much fresh manure in the ground, it will burn the seeds and destroy its vitality. 
When seeds, such as Beans, Cucumbers, Melons and Squash, are planted before it is warm 
enough, they are very apt to rot if it rains. 
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Owing to the open winters in the South, hot beds are not so much used as in the North, 
except to raise such tender plants as Eeg-Plants, Tomatoes and Peppers. There is little forc- 
ing of vegetables done here, except as regards Cucumbers and Lettuce; and, if we do not have 
any hard frosts, the latter does better in the open ground than under glass. To make a hot 
bed is a very simple thing. Any one who has the use of tools can make the wooden frame; the 
sashes may be obtained from any sash factory. I considera wooden frame from five to six feet 
wide and ten feet six inches long a very good size. It should be at least six inches higher at 
the back than in the front, and covered by three sashes 33x5 feet. The manure ought not to 
be over one month old; it should be thrown together in a heap, and when commencing to heat, 
be worked over with a fork, and the long and short manure evenly mixed. In this State the 
ground is generally low, and to retain the heat of the manure for a long time it is best to put 
the manure on top of the ground—that is, make a bank two feet longer and two feet wider than 
the frame. Keep the edges straight and the corners firm; when thrown up about eighteen 
inches trample the manure down to six or eight inches, then put on another layer of eighteen 
inches and trample down again; place thereon the frame and sash, and fill in six inches of good 
earth. After about five days stir the ground to kill the weeds which may have come up, then 
sow the seeds. In lower Louisiana the ground is too wet to dig out eighteen inches deep, 
throw in the manure and trample down as recommended in the North; by a few hard rains, 
such as we frequently have in winter, the manure would become so soaked beneath the eround 
that the heat would be gone. Another advantage, when the frame is put above the ground, is, 
that it will go down with the manure gradually, and there remains always the same space be- 
tween the glass and the ground. If the ground is dug out and the manure put into the frame, 
the ground will sink down so low, after a short time, that the sun will have little effect upon 
it, and plants will become spindly. 
