

185 
CABBAGE. 
A TEST OF VARIETIES. 
So far as the number of varieties is concerned, the test of 
cabbages made the past season was an elaborate one. The 
entire catalogue list was ordered from the principal Ameri- 
can seedsmen, as well as a large number of packages from 
France, Germany and Italy. All together, the list included 
196 differently worded names. As appears from tbe table, 
some of these names were grown from several different 
seedsmen. 
Three separate plantings were made. The first, reported 
in the first table, included 58 early cabbages, and was made 
in boxes in the hot-bed Mar. 4, the plants being transplanted 
to the garden May 3 and 4. <A second planting, including 
both early and late sorts, was made in boxes in the cold 
frame May 6-10, and the plants were transplanted June 
5-9. The third planting, in the main a duplicate of the 
second as regards varieties, was made in the open ground 
May 7-10, the seeds being sown thinly in drills, and the 
young plants thinned when of the proper size, to one and a 
half to two feet apart in the row. In all the plantings, 
packages bearing the same name from different seedsmen, 
were treated as different varieties. 
The soil was well fertilized with stable manure, and 
ploughed in the fall of 1885. In the spring, before planting, 
it was thoroughly cultivated, but not plowed. The rows 
were in all cases three and a half feet apart, and the trans- 
planted plants were set two feet apart in the rows. Twelve 
plants to each name were intended in each of the three 
plantings, but some did not survive, though the plantings 
were reset once. The cultivation all had to be done by 
hand, as the garden beds are too narrow to admit of horse 
culture. 
Through the courtesy of Prof. W. R. Lazenby, and Mr. 
W. J. Green, of the Ohio Experiment Station, an exchange 
was made, whereby our number of samples of seed was 
considerably increased. The cabbages grown at the Ohio 
Station and at our Station the past season were thus largely 
from the same seed packages, and hence a compari- 
son of results may be expected to furnish some interesting 
data in relation to the influence of different soils upon the 
varieties of the cabbage. 
The amount of data is so large that the tables are necess- 
arily somewhat complicated. The second table includes 
both the second and third plantings, and in addition to the 
data noted in the first table, the day oa which the largest 
number of heads was cut is recorded, as an additional index 
of the comparative earliness of the varieties. 
