ARTICHOKE. 



21 



the day) under circumstances whicli prevent us from giving 

 the plant the additional covering it may require. Two 

 other methods, therefore, not dissimilar in themselves, have 

 been suggested — the one to employ hollow cylinders of 

 earthen v/are, covered with a tile or piece of slate, and of 

 capacity sufficient to embrace the plant ; the other to form 

 caps of straw, (such as are used for lodging bees,) and 

 having a moveable top of the same material. To the last 

 method we see no room for objection ; in application it is 

 easy, requiring no skill and but little labour, while the ma- 

 terial and workmanship are both cheap and durable, and 

 their property of excluding rain^ snow and frost, not to be 

 doubted." 



Spring dressing. — " In spring, the litter and earth being 

 removed in March or April, (April or May in this country,) 

 according to the season, the stocks are examined ; and two 

 or three of the strongest or best shoots being selected for 

 growing, the rest are removed by pressure with the thumb, 

 or by a knife, or wooden chisel. Those shoots, or suckers, 

 are used for new plantations. Dig the whole ground level, 

 loosening it to the crown of the roots of every plant." — • 

 Loudon. 



Duration of the plants. — Artichoke plants continue pro- 

 ductive for several years ; but, every season, some well 

 rotted dung, or fresh sea-weed, should be delved into the 

 ground at the winter dressing. It is certain, however, that, 

 after a few years, the plants begin to degenerate, the heads 

 becoming smaller and less succulent. It is therefore a 

 general rule, not to keep an artichoke plantation heyond 

 four, or, at most, six years. Scarcely any kind of grub oi 

 wire-v/orm ever touches the roots of artichokes : they 

 form, therefore, an excellent preparative for a crop of on- 

 ions, shallot or garlic. In many gardens, a small new 

 plantation is formed every year; and in this way the arti- 

 choke season, which begins in June, is prolonged till 

 November; those from the old stock continuing till August, 

 when those from the new stocks come in. If the last 

 gathered be cat with the stems at full length, and if these 

 be stuck among moist sand, the heads may be preserved a 

 month longer. 



Seed. — The heads, when suffered to remain ten days, 

 or a fortnight, after the season of cutting, expand the calix 



