80 JOHNSON & STOKES 
plant all the soil that will conveniently remain there. The 
third merely supplements the second, as the hill has had 
time to become somewhat firm and has settled away a little 
from the upper leaves. 
Boards are used for summer blanching, as they are less 
heating than soil. Ordinary lumber, free from knot holes, is 
employed. The boards rest on their edges, one board on 
each side of the row, the tops being drawn together until 
within 2^ inches of each other, and the lower edge of the 
board held in place either by stakes or by soil. 
The work of handling or hilling must be done only when 
the celery is dry and unfrozen. In fact, celery must never 
be handled when wet (except when preparing it for market), 
or it will surely be rusted and spoiled. 
The same practices of blanching celery as here men- 
tioned in connection with the Kalamazoo operations are in 
vogue near Philadelphia and other Eastern cities, and are 
not new. The real reason that Kalamazoo is so celebrated is 
her possession of that wonderful black muck soil, underlaid 
with standing water. This has attracted the best celery 
growers of the country; men who have small places of from 
one to three acres, and who work out every detail to perfec- 
tion, employing little labor outside of their own families and 
concentrating their efforts on the production of perfect celery 
crops. There are extensive celery growers at Kalamazoo, 
with tracts of thirty or more acres devoted exclusively to 
this vegetable, but the majority of the gardens there are 
small, and much hand-work is done. 
Winter Storage — The art of the winter storage of celery, 
as practiced by large growers, is not hard to learn. Both at 
Kalamazoo and here in the Eastern States there are two 
methods in vogue. One. is the use of especially-built houses, 
and the other is the open-field plan. 
