THE GARDEN

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume LXXVI, Issue 18019, 6 November 1920, Page 2

THE GARDEN

VEGETABLE-CULTURE. Tomatoes: The first week in November is the best time to plant in nearly all places, the exceptions being extra warm localities where there is no frost- It is a great mistake to plant too early. The plants cannot make growth until the soil becomes warm and continues so. It is better to keep the plants in the boxes in a sheltered position until favourable conditions obtain than to plant when they can make no growth to speak of and are liable to severe checks from frost or cold snaps. While in the boxes the plants improve. They may make but little top growth, but the plants will be hardening and roots increasing, so that when they are planted out the plants are tough and hardy and well rooted. I am presuming that the plants have been raised at the proper time, not rushed along in a hurry; such plants are not worth having. There are a number of ways of training, and also a system where there is no training at all. Space will not allow details of the various plans, nor is it at present necessary. The-actual planting and growing of the plants is the same in all cases. The main thing to aim at is a hardy and strong plant to begin with, and then to continue in a direction that will maintain it" in the same state. In some places highly favourable to tomato-culture there is always danger from late frosts, these not uncommonly occurring well into November. To my personal knowledge many extensive plantings have been lost in this way, anti the losses could have been avoided. The plants were too soft when put out. That these losses were avoidable was proved by the fact that other large plantings subject to the same frost and th e same exposure escaped uninjured. At some future time it maybe well to explain this matter more fully; at present it must suffice to say that the plants should be of the description previously mentioned, and that they must not be watered when set out —any one with a superficial knowledge of plant physiology will know why. Apart from that, the plants establish themselves in a shorter time if not watered. When planting brush asidfi the dry surfacecrumbs of soil, make a hole with a trowel deep enough to let the plant down to the first pair of rough leaves, return the soil, and press it firmly around the ball of roots. Evaporation from the leaves will cause the plant to droop under hot sunshine for three or four days. They will pick up each night, and after that will droop no more, but start at once into free growth. Before being* planted out the plants should be sprayed with 4-4-40 Bordeaux mixture. Washing-soda may |be used in place of lime: in which case use rather more than IJIb. of I soda in place of 1 lb. of lime. Broccoli: A start with sowing should have been made before now; lat the present time all varieties may be sown; it, is possible to get small heads by sowing much later. Experience shows that a nearly start is best, as in dry summers the diamondback moth is so serious a pest as to make it impossible in many cases to save the plants unless they are well grown before it appears. Carrots and Parsnips: The main crops should be sown during the first week of the month. Good freeworking soil is necessary, but not of a nover-rich character. No fresh animal manure should be applied. Superphosphate may be used if necessary; about 2 oz. per square yard should be sufficient. Land that was well manured fo ranother crop the previous season will require no addition. During the early part of the season when rain is frequent it is best to sow rather thickly, because a number of young plants succeed in breaking the beaten surface when a small number might fail to do so. Now, however, that germination is more rapid and there is little likelihood of there being too much rain, the seed should be distributed as thinly as possible, saving a great, deal of labou • in thinning. Onions: Pickling-onions are obtained by sowing the Silver-skin variety on very poor soil, which must be of a good working description, towards the end of November. Make the surface firm by treading or rolling. Sow in broad drills about 1 ft. apart, ra'her thinly, and do no thinning. If weeds are not likely to be troublesome the seed may be broadcasted.

Other Sowings: Red beet of a long variety should be sown for winter use. Silver beet may be sown at almost any time of Jhe year; possibly about now is the best time. The plants should be thinned to 12in* apart- Sow a small breadth of turnips as required. Distribute the seeds rather thinkly, and very little thinning will be required, this being done by pulling the roots as they become large enough for use. Cabbage and savoy should be sown about the 25th November to provide the winter crop for the North Island. It is better to, sow several weeks earlier in the South Island. Make successional sowing of peas, French and butter beans, lettuce and radish. Pumpkins. marrows, pie-melons, watermelons, rock-melons, and hardy cucumbers should be sown in th e open ground early in the month. Asparagus: Cease cutting when peas come in. The heavier the crop that matures and dies down the better the prospect for the following season.

Celery: Early plants should be ready for planting out. Really good heads can be obtained only by the old trench method. There are many adaptations of this method, the principal difference being the width of trenches and number of rows in a trench, the number sometimes extending to a dozen rows. The latest method is to use no trench at all, this being the plan at present most common in market gardens. A selfblanching variety—usually Henderson s White Plume—is grown. The plants are set out in beds 6ft to Bft. wide, with the plants about lOin. apart. Close growing assists in the blanching. The resulting heads are small and not of great merit—quite satisfactory, however, for cooking purposes. The heads find ready sale, and though the price they bring is

not great they cost little to produce and must be a very much more profitable crop than by the trench system. This plan is commended to those who are too busy to make trendies.—W. H. Taylor, Horticulturist, in N.Z. , Journal of Agriculture- i APPLES AND PRESIDENTS. A good many men, being nominated for high office, proceed forthwith to have themselves photographed in farm garb (says a writer in the "Farm Journal.”) Accepting the nomination with much grandiloquence, but little modesty, they don overalls— usually forgetting, however, to take off their boiled shirt or their white collar—mount a cultivator or a binder and flatter themselves that they win the farmer vote. Moreover, from the dim recesses of long-forgotten attics they extricate old tin-types, showing them as boys clothed in archaic fashion, from cop-per-toed and red-topped boots to round stiff hat; thus proving themselves self-made men who inordinately worship their creator. This year, however, we are being shown bona-fide pictures of farm homes where candidates were born, genuine photographs of boyhood days on the farm. It is significant that three of the four men nominal - ed for the Presidency and Vice-Pre-sidency by the dominant parties were actually born on the farm, while the fourth is a small-town product. It’s the safest guess I know that a farm-born man will our next President. You can wager the back forty on this —it you’re the betting kind —and sleep soundly. There’s no danger of losing. Warren G. Harding and James M. Cox were born on farms in Ohio; Calvin Coolidge was born on a farm in Massachusetts; Franklin D. Roosevelt was born in a village in New York- If a man never quite forgets his birthplace and early surroundings—as I believe to be true—farmers may confidently expect to be remembered by the incoming administration, no matter who may head it. It will be a good thing. We have had twenty-seven Presidents; only two (George Washington and William Henry Harrison) have been farmers. Nineteen have been lawyers, two soldiers, two statesmen, one a public official, one a college professor. It is high tim e the lawyers were allowed to stay home and potter round with their torts and demurrers, permitting farm-editors to take charge of the White House garden. What man, having been born on the farm and having spent his early days there, can completely forget or utterly ignore the farm and the farmers? The Presidential nominees must stop every now and then, in the hurly-burly of campaigning, to . think what a jump it will be—whichever one makes it —from the cornrows of boyhood to Jhe White House of manhood. Both have hoed their own rows, clean and straight; one will be rewarded by the highest honours at the nation’s bestowal. It is the farmer’s year. At for the fourth candidate, born in a small town, instead of on the farm, it is of interest to know that he made his firs.t political campaign on the issue of uniform apple barrels, thereby winning the farmer vote the very first thing. May we venture the hope, should he keep up his apple campaigning for the still larger prize, that he will prove neither a Winesap nor a Crab; that he will give ear to others than the wealthy; that he will never say or do anything to make a maiden blush; that he will never be a Northern Spy, save when he is trying to find some excuse for the existence of Ben Davis; that he will quickly prove himself a Pippin; and that he will always do things to the eternal credit of our dearly beloved brother Jonathan.

WHEN THE NERVES GIVE WAY. GET DR. WILLIAMS’ PINK PILLS. Hardly any condition of iJI-henlth deserves more pity than that for which there is generally least sympathy. Men and women with nerves out of gear be come irritable and fretful and are blamed for ill-temper; whereas it is not their fault. Their health is the cause. Often the nerves have given way under the strain of working for the very people who reproach the sufferers. The tired, over-busy wife or mother, whose household cares have worn her out; the bread-winner whose anxiety for his family has worried him until he is thin and ill. are the nerve-sufferers who become run down. Their nerves, like all the bodily organs, need healthy red blood; worry tells on their digestion and their nerves are ill-fed. In such cases a course of Dr. Williams’ Pink Pills for Pale People is necessary, for these pills make new blood and tone up the nervous system, by which method they invigorate t’hoso whose nerves have given away. The patients become high spirited and full of energy. Nervous starts and irritability are gone. Happiness for themselves and others returns. You can begin to ge| well now, for Dr. Williams’ Pink Pilis are to be obtained from all chemists and storekeepers; ask distinctly for Dr. Williams’, to obtain the genuine, and start to-day.

Write for the free booklet, “Diseases of the Nervous .System,” to Dr. Williams’ Medicine Co., Box 845, G.P.0., Wellington.