22 
BULLETIN 527, U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 
Fig. 2S.— Flat. 
gardener removes a quantity of plants from the hotbed to a warm 
room and transplants them to the flats. The flats with the newly 
planted seedlings in them are then placed in the cold frames. Later 
they may be transplanted to the soil of the cold frame or to the 
field direct. 
Flats vary considerably in size. Perhaps the most common sizes 
are 20 to 24 inches in length, and 15 to 16 inches in width; 2\ inches- 
is the usual depth. The ends are in most cases made of J-inch 
material and the sides and bottom of i-inch 
material. Cracks J inch in width are left 
in the bottom to provide for drainage. 
Figure 28 shows a flat 24 by 16 by 2\ 
inches inside measurement. Make several 
flats of this or any other convenient size, using ^-inch material for 
the ends and ^-inch material for the sides and bottom. Leave J-inch 
cracks hi the bottom. From the experience you have had in previous 
exercises you will be able to construct them without having the de- 
tailed instructions before you. Make out a bill of materials, a bill 
of stock, cut the pieces, square them up, and assemble them. 
Inexpensive flats are often made by gardeners from soap or other 
similar boxes by sawing the box into sections about 2\ inches in 
depth and nailing strips on these sections to form bottoms for the 
flats. Figure 29 shows how to mark out the box for sawing it into 
sections. Get a box and some pieces of i-inch strips for bottoms 
and make a few flats in this way. If the 
box has a bottom and a cover on it, you 
can use these for the bottoms of two of 
the flats. 
Fig. 
29.— Method of marking box 
for sawing into fiats. 
Note to Teacher. — Flats should be found in every 
school where agriculture is taught. They may be 
used in connection with a hotbed and cold frame as 
described previously or be placed in sunny windows 
in the schoolhouse. Plants for study during the 
winter or for transplanting to the garden to secure 
early crops are often grown successfully in flats in 
schoolhonses. A shelf wide enough for the flats is built on a level with the window sill. 
EXERCISE IX. FORCING BOX. 
A very practical piece of equipment for use in forcing the growth 
of rhubarb and asparagus in the early spring is shown in figure 30. 
One of these hexes is placed over a clump of rhubarb or asparagus 
late in the fall or early in the spring, and barnyard manure is filled in 
around the box. The heal from the manure and from the sun's rays 
through the glass cover warms the soil under the box, and as a result 
the plants start to grow earlier. Often plants can be forced to pro- 
