The seeds sprout so slowly that it is well to plant some quick-growing seed with them to break the soil, else it may have to be broken by hand. The parsnip is hardy and the seeds may be sown as soon as the ground can be put in condition, but it must be the main crop, for it takes the whole season to grow the long roots. The roots may be left in the ground until the next spring, as the hard winter freezes do not injure them. In that case you must store a large part of the crop in cool pits or cellars, because the best price is obtained in the late winter or very early spring when the ground is often frozen so hard that you can’t pull the roots up. It would not pay to blast them out, you know. There need be no waste where stock is kept, because the ragged roots make excellent feed. The Hollow Crown and the Student varieties are the standards. A good crop is 500 to 600 bushels to the acre, but under good conditions, this can be bettered. No serious pests or diseases consume the parsnips, so men and stock get all that grow. SALSIFY. The salsify plant tastes so like an oyster that it is called the oyster plant. It is grown for kitchen use only, not for stock. Like its cousin, the parsnip, it must be sown in deep, rich soil and given the whole season to mature. Salsify can be left in the ground all winter, unless it is needed for the late winter or early spring market. The seeds sprout quickly and may be sown as early as the soil is ready. Like beet seed, the salsify seed is really a fruit, long and hard like a stick, and it is somewhat difficult to use a seed drill in sowing them. An ounce of seed sows only about 70 feet of drill; an acre requires eight to ten pounds and a good yield is from 200 to 300 bushels per acre. There are no serious insects or diseases. There are two important modifications of salsify known as Black Salsify and Spanish Salsify. The regular type is a biennial, though cultivated as an annual, becoming wild and losing its fleshy root if left in the ground longer; but the Black, which is grown just the same as the main type, is perennial, and the roots continue to enlarge, yet to remain edible, though left in the ground more than one year. It has broader leaves than the regular salsify and a long black root, yellow flowers and light seeds. Spanish salsify is not generally known in this country. Its root is much lighter in color and not so strong in flavor, but with careful cooking it develops other qualities of its own that are most agreeable. Moreover, it is easily cultivated and yields larger returns than the regular salsify and the average person would not know the difference. It is sown and cultivated just as salsify is, and when bleached the young leaves are eaten like cardoons, that is, as a pot-herb. HORSE-RADISH.