Conducted by The Editor will be glad to answer subscribers' queries pertaining to individual problems connected with the gar- 
F. F. Rockwell den and grounds. When a direct personal reply is desired please. enclose a self-addressed stamped envelope. 
February 
HE days now are beginning to look a 
little more as if summer might pos¬ 
sibly return again sometime. And with 
the melting snow, and the longer after¬ 
noons, there is more encouragement to 
begin actually doing something toward the 
garden. If you have not yet a cold frame 
or hotbed, read the suggestions in last 
month's department — and act on them. It 
is an easy matter to get the frame ready 
for the sash, and then if you haven't any 
artificial heat, such as a hot water pipe 
running through, or a flue under, the 
frames, use manure to supply heat, and 
after it has served this purpose, it will be 
in better shape to use on the garden than 
it was before. If you will take the slight 
trouble of preparing the manure, instead 
of trusting blindly to luck and taking it 
direct from the pile, results will be much 
more certain. Make a heap of the de¬ 
sired amount (it should be at least fifteen 
inches deep when put into the frames), 
and stack it in a compact form, taking out 
all coarse straw and litter. If it is very 
dry wet it down, but don't soak it, while 
the pile is being built up. Turn it two 
or three times in the course of a couple 
of weeks, being careful not to let it “fire- 
fang;” and then tramp it into the frames 
— which should be at least two feet deep — 
and cover with about four inches of well 
pulverized sod soil. 
When a thermometer plunged into the 
soil recedes to seventy degrees, sow your 
seeds, either directly in the soil or in 
“flats,” as you prefer. 
If you have a cellar window on the 
south side of the house, you have an ideal 
opportunity of heating three or four 
sashes by building the frame over this 
window, and hinging it, so that air may 
be let in from the cellar. This can be 
done now, as the ground is probably not 
frozen hard in such a place, and it needs 
very little digging out — just making level, 
so that flats may rest evenly upon it. By 
making a cover of old carpet or bags for 
such a frame it may be kept to nearly 
forty degrees in windy zero weather, and 
will average high enough to be just right 
for starting cabbage and the more hardy 
vegetable and flower seeds, which, with 
proper management, may be followed by 
tomatoes, eggplant and the tenderer sorts 
of vegetables. If it is absolutely out of 
the question for you to make a hotbed or 
frame of this sort, then start a few flats 
of seed in the house ; a high temperature 
will not be required. In any case, you 
will want a few coldframes handy to take 
the first lot of transplanted seedlings from 
the place in which they were started. Have 
these frames ready and the glass put on 
tight, so that they will be getting thawed 
out and warmed up ready for use. 
Seedlings started in flats in the house do not 
need a high temperature 
Starting Right 
HE question of seed sowing is a per¬ 
ennial one—and an all-important 
one. In an article on “Starting Plants 
Indoors,’’ which appeared in House & 
Garden last March, this is taken up in de¬ 
tail. But for new readers, and those who 
have not followed our advice of keeping 
every copy of the magazine for purposes 
of reference, brief directions are given 
here. Also, I have a new “wrinkle” in 
this seed starting business which has 
proved more successful with me than any 
other. Last fall, when every bit of gar¬ 
den soil about my place was ash-dry and 
I wanted to start immediately some seeds 
that were late in reaching me, I had to 
use some very clayey soil, that would have 
packed solid if watered on the surface in 
the ordinary way. I placed in the bottom 
of the seed flat about two inches of sphag¬ 
num moss, which was then soaked with 
water; this was covered to little more tharl 
half the remaining depth of the box with 
soil which was given as much water as it 
would readily absorb (the soil being quite 
dry, but the most moist I could get). The 
box was then leveled off and the seeds 
sown and covered without being watered 
at all—the surface left dry. In the course 
of a few hours the surface soil had come 
to just the right degree of moisture, ab¬ 
sorbed from below, and remained in this 
condition, drawing upon the surplus con¬ 
tained by the moss until after the seeds 
were well up. Since then I have used 
this method regularly. 
For those not familiar with the sowing 
of seeds, the following condensed instruc¬ 
tions are given : Get some soap or cracker 
boxes, and saw them through lengthwise 
into “flats” about three inches deep, cov¬ 
ering the bottoms with boards of the same 
material and making in these, if they are 
tight, seven or eight half-inch holes. 
Cover the bottoms with coarse screenings, 
or any coarse material, that will furnish 
drainage (or moss, as suggested above), 
and then fill the boxes level full with 
sifted soil, prepared of two parts of light 
loam and one each of leaf mould and 
coarse sand (if these ingredients are not 
handy, any light garden soil will do; don't 
quit for want of exactly the right thing) ; 
scatter the seed thinly and evenly, press 
in with a small piece of board or block, 
and cover very lightly — just so the seed 
cannot be seen. Give a thorough watering 
with a very fine spray, or through a folded 
piece of burlap, and place in a tempera¬ 
ture of about fifty to sixty degrees for 
cabbage, etc., or sixty to eighty for egg¬ 
plant, tomatoes, cucumbers and other heat- 
loving vegetables. If the boxes can be 
placed on top of return pipes, a boiler, or 
the back of a kitchen stove, so much the 
better, only be sure to remove them the 
moment the seeds break ground. Then 
place them near the light, and give a care¬ 
ful, thorough watering whenever the boxes 
dry out—not whenever you happen to 
think about it. 
What Now? 
H OW about that garden PLAN? Is 
it done yet? If not, get after it at 
once — for upon that depends so largely 
the real efficiency of your garden or the 
beauty of your grounds, as the case may 
be. If that plan isn't ready you are handi- 
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