Making Home ProfitableSaint Maur, Kate V. (Kate Vandenhoff)
Science
Making Home Profitable
Saint Maur, Kate V. (Kate Vandenhoff)
Agriculture; Country life
It is estimated that it takes fifteen bushels of potatoes after they
have been cut into quarters, to plant an acre, which should return
one hundred and thirty bushels of salable potatoes, by which is meant
large and medium sized potatoes, small ones not entering into the
calculation. There will be in all probability about thirty bushels of
these dwarfs, which are excellent fattening food for poultry and pigs
when cooked and mashed up.
The space intended for carrots requires extremely good cultivation, for
the soil must be thoroughly pulverised. Tie the seeds in a piece of
cheese cloth, steep in water for twelve hours, then hang up in a warm
room to drip and dry sufficiently to prevent their sticking together
when being planted. Another aid we furnish these delicate seedlings is
to drop a radish seed every six inches, because they germinate quickly
and throw a strong seed leaf, which breaks the crust over the row and
allows the fragile carrot sprout free access.
Allow two feet from the last row of potatoes, stretch the line, and
with a pointed stick draw a shallow drill in which to scatter the
carrot seed. Covering must not be more than a fourth of an inch; press
down firmly. Between each two rows of carrots allow one foot. Steep and
use only half the seed at first, planting the remainder twenty days
later. With good ground and cultivation you should have carrots late in
June.
A thirty-inch space must divide the carrots from the beets. Prepare the
ground as before, but make the drill a full inch deep, dropping the
seed half an inch apart, the rows two feet apart. These should be ready
for use the first week in June. Keep half the seed for late planting.
Early turnips can start another two feet along. Drill half an inch
deep, the rows one foot apart.
“First of All” peas are semi-dwarf, but yield much better if given some
support. We plant every two rows seven inches apart, in a drill one
inch deep, and when the peas are two inches high we stick brush between
the rows, so making a hedge of vine when developed. Twin rows should be
two feet apart.
For onion sets, make drills an inch and a half deep, placing the sets
upright and from four to six inches apart. Firm the earth all around,
and the fourth of an inch over them. These will furnish early onions
for cooking. For onion seed the soil cannot be too carefully prepared,
for, like carrots, they are long in germinating and extremely fragile.
A few radish seeds can again be used as pioneers. Instead of commercial
fertiliser, the poultry droppings are used for onions, being reduced
to a powder by grinding in an old chopping machine. Sprinkle freely,
within one inch of the centre of the row, and from three to four inches
each side of it. Unless rain falls within a few days, water very
thoroughly with a sprinkler. Hen droppings seem especially desirable
for all bulbs and tubers.
Lettuce seed requires well-enriched soil; drill one-fourth of an inch
deep, the rows one foot apart.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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