564 



DICTIONARY OF SEASONABLE GARDEN WORK. 



Currants.— Frnne out old wood and part of the new. 

 The young shoots can be used for cuttings. 



Egg-Plants. — A little hay, or other litter, placed over 

 the plants during the first frosty nights will save them 

 for further usefulness. 



General Garden Management. — Continue the figh' 

 against weeds. Let none get ripe and scatter seeds- 

 All late crops that do not cover the ground should be 

 kept cultivated and hoed as late as possible. Get frames 

 and forcing-pits in readiness for the coming season. 

 Gather seeds of all choice vegetables. 



General Orchard Management. — Thin late fruit. 

 This is much better than propping up the limbs and 

 gathering and marketing a lot of inferior stuff. Keep on 

 hand a good supply of ladders. Make provision for 

 packages. Use new barrels for apples, half-barrels or 

 crates for pears, improving as much as possible on the 

 usages of your particular market. Let no fruit go to 

 waste this season ; there is none too much. Pruning 

 may be done where needed. In young orchards, hunt 

 up and destroy borers. Don't grow grain — with the pos- 

 sible exception of buckwheat — among young or old fruit- 

 trees. If you intend setting a young apple or pear 

 orchard this fall, prepare the land early, and set the trees 

 next month. Stone-fruits should be planted in spring. 



Grapes. — See and heed the advice about handling the 

 crop, as found elsewhere in this issue. Whatever you 

 do, refrain from marketing grapes before they are ripe 

 and palatable. 



Grape-Forcing. — In houses where the wood has 

 ripened and leaves begin to fall, prune the vines and 

 cleanse the canes. Now wash and paint the inside 

 work. Keep the forcing-houses as cool as possible. In 

 later houses, keep the temperature about 50° to 60° at 

 night, and 6g° to 75° during the day. When fruit begins 

 to ripen, keep the atmosphere rather dry. 



Kale. — There is yet time to sow seed to obtain greens 

 for fall and winter. Transplant the kale from the seed- 

 bed into well-prepared and highly-manured soil, or sow 

 the seed thinly in drills, and begin to use the largest 

 leaves when plants are about six inches high. Growth 

 will continue more or less all winter. 



Lettuce. — Sow seed, and later transfer the plants into 

 frames. This will give you a late fall crop. 



Melons. — All late fruit that stands no chance of ripen- 

 ing should be removed at once, unless it is wanted for 

 pickling material. 



Onions. — Pull them up as soon as most of the tops 

 have died down, leaving the bulbs on the ground to cure. 

 Gather them up when perfectly dry, and store them in a 

 loft or other airy place where they will be safe from rain 



or dampness. Market them as soon as you can get them 

 ready. If you wish to try planting sets in fall, send for 

 a supply of the Extra Early Pearl this month, and plant 

 about October i. Fall sowing of any of our ordinary 

 varieties is not a success here. 



Pears. — The crop is ready to pick as soon as the color 

 begins to change and the stem will part readily from 

 the branch. The ripening process should then be con- 

 tinued indoors in a still, dark room, which must be cool 

 for slow ripening and warm for quick ripening. For 

 marketing especially fine fruit, use small packages. 

 Bartletts may be picked while hardly more than half 

 grown. They will ripen up for market, and sometimes 

 bring a much better price than the later, fully-developed 

 and matured pears, while those left on the tree will come 

 out all the finer, and perhaps continue later in good 

 condition. 



Peaches will be especially scarce this year; gather and 

 market them with greatest care. The trees must be 

 looked over repeatedly, and the specimens picked when 

 just in the right condition. 



Plums. — Pick the trees over repeatedly, taking off 

 each time only those specimens that are just right for 

 market or use. 



Peppers. — Harvest before frost touches them. 



Spinach.— Sovi seed for spring greens in rows a foot 

 apart. In early winter the plants may be thinned if too 

 crowded, and the thinnings used for greens. 



Snails. — Spraying with lime-water after dark will 

 quickly clear them from anything they infest. Sprink. 

 ling dry lime or ashes about infested plants is also a sure 

 remedy. 



Squashes. — Let no specimens worth saving be touched 

 by frost. Gather them, and store in a dry, warm place. 



Sweet-Potatoes may be left out until after the first 

 fall frost, when the tops should at once be cut off, the 

 tubers spaded or forked out, gathered when dry, and 

 stored in a dry, warm room or packed in sand. 



Strawberries. — Keep the beds scrupulously clear of 

 weeds. For forcing the crop, see directions given else- 

 where. 



Tomatoes. — Frost usually comes before the crop is all 

 gathered. It is a good plan to protect some fine plants 

 during the first few frosty nights by covering them lightly 

 with litter or hay. The tomatoes will then continue to 

 ripen in the fine warm days that usually follow after 

 these first frosts. Or you may pull up some of the plants 

 and hang them by the roots in some sheltered spot. The 

 tomatoes will thus continue to ripen, although in quality 

 they will not equal those ripened in the natural way.. 



Turnips. — Weed and thin them. 



