64 
in the dirt when digging in spite of all the care we 
may use. 
We cure them very slowly, leaving the bulblets at¬ 
tached to the bulb in so far as possible. Many of the 
bulblets will still be quite small and white when dug, 
but if cured slowly in dirt, these will develop into good 
bulblets and will ripen in storage. 
When we have a great many of the newer varieties 
and only a few of a kind, we place each kind in a small 
sack as soon as dug, being careful to label each sack. 
Clean flour sacks are best. The most convenient labels 
we have found are the small wooden labels, with wire 
attached, which nurserymen commonly use as tree 
labels. They are painted on one side and can usually 
be obtained at any seed store at a cost of about $8.00 
per thousand. 
Before sacking, the tops of the plants are cut off, 
cutting close to the bulb. The sacks are placed on racks 
in a drying shed where there is plenty of air and left 
to dry slowly. The bulblets are left attached to the 
bulbs till fully ripened. The bulbs may then be re¬ 
moved and cleaned and dried more thoroughly, and the 
bulblets cleaned and stored in fine dirt which has passed 
through a 12-mesh screen. Fine dirt holds moisture 
better than sand. 
When it is cold and rainy, tents stretched on light 
portable frames, as previously mentioned, are of great 
assistance in digging and have saved many a day for us 
which otherwise would have been lost. They may also 
be lighted and the digging continued at night. 
If the method of shallow planting has been used, it 
will be found that there are not only a great many more 
bulblets, but they are also a great deal easier to dig 
