American Agriculturist, September 15,1923 
175 
Vegetables For All the Year 
Proper Storage Makes Orderly Marketing Possible 
T HEst°rag e of veg- By PAUL WORK 
-L etables is an im¬ 
portant means toward the banish¬ 
ment of that dread period in late 
winter when most people take it for 
granted they will not feel well—when 
the big dark bottle of tonic and the litr 
tie brown pill must be evoked. Plenty 
of tomatoes and carrots and spinach 
and onions and cabbage and squash ac¬ 
complish the same object and to much 
greater advantage. 
The _ man on the farm may well 
recognize as his first duty in this con¬ 
nection the providing of an ample sup¬ 
ply of winter vegetables for the family. 
Then he may delve into the question 
as to whether he can with profit help 
the distant city dweller to “eat veg¬ 
etables for vitamins” in February as 
well as August. 
The principles of commercial and 
home storage 
are the same. 
If the commod¬ 
ity is to be sold, 
it is necessary 
to consider well 
the state of the 
markets to be 
served, the 
probable crops 
in other sections 
and the various 
items of cost 
which are in¬ 
volved. These 
last mount much 
larger than a 
casual examina¬ 
tion of the mat¬ 
ter would sug¬ 
gest. To learn 
the price that 
one must realize 
out of storage it 
is necessary to 
think of interest 
and depreciation 
of equipment, 
extra labor in handling in and out, 
sorting and trimming, extra hauling, 
heating and ventilation, if buildings 
are used, and the usually heavy losses 
through shrinkage and decay. 
Stored vegetables are not dead. Life 
processes continue. The most important 
of these processes, respiration, releases 
energy that is stored in starch and 
other substances. In the field this en¬ 
ergy is used in growth, while in storage 
it takes the form of heat? Respira¬ 
tion slowly but surely consumes the 
substance of the stored material. A 
low temperature serves to retard this 
process. This explains the necessity for' 
a cool place to store vegetables. 
Moreover warmth favors the develop¬ 
ment of fungous and bacterial diseases 
which cause decay in many forms. On 
the other hand freezing temperatures 
break the plant cells and in other ways 
injure or kill, leaving the way open for 
the decay which speedily overtakes all 
dead material. It is generally held that 
iluctuation in temperature is also harm¬ 
ful. 
Ventilation is Essential 
Water constantly evaporates from 
stored products, causing shrinkage as 
well as deterioration in quality. The 
dryer the air in storage, the more rapid 
is the evaporation. If the air is too moist, 
water condenses, thus favoring decay. 
Ventilation is of value for the removal 
of waste gases and as an aid in the 
control of moisture and temperature. 
The last and most important re¬ 
quirement is that the vegetables stored 
shall be in prime condition. It does 
not pay to invest space and labor and 
to accept risk for produce that is not 
ot the best. All bruises, cuts and dis¬ 
eased spots should be avoided as these 
blemishes are frequently the starting 
points for decay which speedily spreads 
to otherwise healthy specimens. Pro¬ 
duce should not be over-mature as 
! opening continues in storage and over- 
oupe specimens soon go down. 
Perhaps the best and handiest place 
tor home storage is a well protected cel- 
•ar where ventilation is possible and 
where the temperature can be main¬ 
tained just above freezing. In the 
house, the storage room should be par¬ 
titioned off from the rest of the cellar 
especially if there is a furnace. A 
cement floor is no ad¬ 
vantage, as an earth 
bottom helps keep the moisture con¬ 
tent of the air more nearly correct. 
Ventilation may be provided through a 
simple opening near the ceiling. Bet¬ 
ter still, there may be openings at top 
and bottom. In + he fall the room may 
be kept cool by opening at night and 
closing in the morning. Later this ar¬ 
rangement may be reversed. 
Outside wooden walls are best made 
frost proof by providing dead air 
spaces. Dry still air is the best in¬ 
sulating material. Also walls may be 
banked outside and the roofs of out¬ 
door cellars or caves may be covered 
with earth, straw, manure, leaves or 
other suitable material. 
As far as quality of the product 
when taken out is concerned there are 
few methods of storage better than 
burying, al¬ 
though the risk 
is increased as 
there is little 
control of tem¬ 
perature and 
moisture. Freez¬ 
ing results if 
covering is too 
light, while 
heating and de¬ 
cay follow if too 
much protection 
is given. 
The first re¬ 
quirement i n 
burying is to 
select a spot 
that is well 
drained and ac¬ 
cessible. The 
shape of the pit 
is unimportant, 
though six or 
eight feet is 
generally wide 
enough and the 
length may be 
adjusted to suit. It is well to place a 
layer of straw in the bottom, and then 
pile the vegetables in a ridge. If the 
heap is to be opened at different times, 
it may be divided with straw or leaves. 
Straw or hay or leaves are used to 
cover the vegetables, then alternate 
layers of earth and straw, leaves or 
manure are added until the required 
protection has been provided. 
In the fall it is well to avoid cov¬ 
ering tightly at the top and final clos¬ 
ing may be delayed until severe 
weather sets in. If the heap of vege¬ 
tables is large it is worth while to set 
a sheaf of rye or a bundle of straw in 
the middle every few feet to provide a 
little ventilation. 
A very simple way to store veg¬ 
etables is to put them in a barrel and 
bury it, using leaves or straw so that 
the end may be readily accessible. 
The root crops, potatoes and cab¬ 
bage are not at all difficult to store. 
All that is necessary is to observe the 
general principles, many different 
methods being equally successful. Cab¬ 
bage is sometimes spread in the woods 
and covered with leaves, although the 
present tendency for commercial stor¬ 
age is toward the use of special in¬ 
sulated houses. Immature cabbage 
will harden up wonderfully if stored 
roots on in a trench. Parsnips and 
salsify for spring use may be left in the 
ground where they grew. Onions keep 
in common storage but they require a 
drier atmosphere than most vegetables. 
They will keep well in a cool 
attic. Squash and sweet potatoes 
should have a higher temperature dur¬ 
ing the first few weeks of storage and 
may well be kept at say 60 degrees all 
winter. Celery is one of the most diffi¬ 
cult of the vegetables to store success¬ 
fully. It keeps well in trenches but 
must not be too heavily covered at 
first. More celery is lost from heating 
than from freezing. It may well be 
kept in the cellar in boxes with the 
roots in moist earth. When a cellar 
tends to be overdry, vegetables of 
most sorts may be packed in soil which 
will hold moisture all winter 
“We have been taking your paper 
for over twenty-two years.”—-Edward 
Zeitz, McKees Rocks, N. Y. 
A closed pit of beets and carrots. The 
basket covers the vent. When severe 
weather sets in, this is covered with 
straw and manure 
* 
Montgomery Ward £? (?. 
The Oldest Mailorder House 
is Today theMost Regressive 
Your Copy of this New Fall and 
Winter Catalogue is Waiting for You 
One copy of this new complete Catalogue is here—waiting for you merely 
to fill in the coupon below with your name and address. 
Your copy of this Catalogue is waiting—to bring into your home the 
lowest prices of the year, to bring to you and your family an opportunity 
for saving so important that you can not afford to miss it. 
This Book Keeps Prices Down 
You too may as well save money on nearly everything you buy. Ask for 
this Catalogue and see for yourself the lowest price, the right price to pay. 
You do not need to pay more. 
In our work of “ keeping prices down” we have searched the markets of 
the world. Over Forty Million Dollars’ worth of goods have been bought at 
the lowest possible prices and the 
savings are passed on to you. 
And with this saving, with these 
low prices, there is also an assur¬ 
ance of dependable quality—Ward 
Quality. We sell only the kind of 
goods that stand inspection and use 
—the kind that will hold your pat¬ 
ronage. We maintain the standard 
of Ward Quality no matter how low 
the price.- 
Everything for the Home, the Farm 
and the Family 
Ft)R WOMEN < This book shows the 
best New York Fashions, selected in New 
York by our own New York Fashion Experts. 
And everything is sold without the usual 
“fashion profits.” This book will be a delight, 
a matter of style news, and a saving to every 
American woman. 
FOR THE HOME: Carpets, furni¬ 
ture, bedding, electrical devices, everything 
new for home use, everything used in decora-" 
tion and to make the home modern and com¬ 
plete. And the prices always mean a saving, 
FOR THE MEN AND THE FARM t 
Everything a man uses or wears, from tools 
and hardware and famous Riverside Tires, 
to virgin wool suits—often one-third less than 
prices you are paying. 
The coupon below brings this new, com¬ 
plete Fall and Winter Catalogue to you and 
your family—entirely free. 
Montgomery Ward & Co. 
Chicago Kansas City St. Paul 
Portland, Ore. Fort Worth 
3SSSfftSs" 
sW PPed Vi e e a s S ha «« 
Z bette U r r t £ r0miae 
orrtL — because.. tha « our 
fS° er ^d&Cn r from Mont 
will k Carly ev ery C t T and feel sure 
h °urs b an d hlpped in l^Th ° rder 
ilho£ nd m °*t freqUeruiylyithfif 
To 
’MONTGOMERY 
WARD & CO. 
Dept.80-H 
Chicago, Kansas City, 
St. Paul, Portland, Ore., 
Fort Worth. (Mail this cou¬ 
pon to the house nearest you.) 
r Please mail me my free copy of 
’Montgomery Ward’s complete 
Fall and Winter Catalogue. 
Name. 
Address. 
