The Busy Woman's Garden Book. Ida D. Bennett
will answer, or bone meal may be used or a commercial fertilizer, for the plants will need food at this stage of their growth, should be prepared and the frame set on this or sunk a few inches into the ground to insure warmth and prevent the ingress of small rodents which somehow show a peculiar penchant for hotbeds and cold frames and have been known to destroy a whole planting of seeds in a single night. A little nitrate of soda scattered between the rows of cabbage and cauliflower will work wonders in the growth of these plants and is to be recommended at this stage of their growth and again when transplanted into the open ground.
Other forms of plant protection are found in the frameless beds protected by lath screens; these are used mainly during the summer months and are especially adapted for growing pansies from seed to be transferred to cold frames in the fall and grown on until time to plant out in permanent beds in spring; for growing violets in like manner and also for starting cabbage seed to be held over winter in cold frames for early spring planting.
The Sand Box
Is used as an auxiliary to the hotbed for a nursery for those plants which are to be used in the house or conservatory during winter and must be kept in a growing, but not blooming, condition during summer and shifted from pot to pot as occasion requires. Though mainly essential in the growing of house plants it is often found of much use as a place to carry on such vegetable plants as one may desire to pot off for sale or for stockier growth, previous to setting in the open ground. The sand box consists of any shallow box of sufficient size to hold a considerable number of two to four inch pots. It should not, preferably, be over three feet wide but may be of any desired length. Five inches is a good depth. It should be elevated on some kind of support, at a convenient height to work at when sitting on a stool or box. When used for growing house plants it is usually placed in a rather shady spot on the east side of the house, but if used for vegetables it may be given a more sunny, exposed position; it should be filled with clean sand into which the pots are plunged to their rims and the sand is kept constantly wet. The pots should be turned around in the sand every day or two to prevent the roots, which escape through the hole in the bottom of the pot, growing in the sand; to prevent this also place a piece of broken crock or glass over the drainage hole. In potting off plants from the hotbed use a small thumb-pot at first and re-pot in one a size larger as soon as the roots form a network around the outside of the ball of earth: this condition may be ascertained by tapping the pot against the side of the box which will loosen the ball of earth and allow it to drop out on the hand. Plants that are to go into the ground in late May will probably not require re-potting, certainly not more than once, but this treatment makes stocky, well-rooted plants that command a better price than the untransplanted plants from the beds, though there is always an excellent market for all the products of the hotbed.
Sowing Seed in Flats in the House
Is the simplest, and least satisfactory form of advance work in the garden; it belongs in the class of being "better than nothing," but for some plants is quite as successful as a hotbed, unfortunately that particular class is not embraced in a book on vegetable gardening, but belongs particularly to flower gardening and the special sorts dedicated to the warm conservatory and window garden.
However, if one has not, and cannot achieve, the advantage of a hotbed then one must make the most of what is attainable and resort to flats. These may be of any shape or size, but the usual florists' flats—about fifteen inches wide and twenty long and not over five inches deep—are of a practical size for general use; narrower ones which may be set on a window sill are also useful but will not give a large number of plants. Very convenient plant boxes which simulate a miniature hotbed, being about six inches high in the back and about four in front, of the usual flat size and supplied with a hinged lid of glass, are sold by the florists but are easily manufactured at home and are better than the open flats as they enable one to regulate moisture, the principal trouble—owing to the dry air of the living rooms, the shallowness of the soil, in growing plants in flats.
Several holes for drainage should be made in the bottom of the boxes and these covered with pieces of shard or glass and the boxes filled to within a half inch of the top with a good compost consisting of fibrous loam—that shaved from the bottom of sods—leaf mould, clean white sand and a little well-rotted manure, all thoroughly mixed and free from roughage.
The seeds should be broadcasted, if fine, drilled in if coarse, and the soil pressed down snugly over them. In the case of fine seed it is a good idea to cover with fine white sand instead of soil as this is less subject to the minute fungus which causes the deadly "damping off" so destructive to plant life and especially troublesome in growing plants in the house.
As in the planting in the hotbed, the seed plots should be carefully labeled with name and date of sowing. After planting the seeds the flats should be set in a pan of water until the surface looks dark but not wet. They should then be covered with a sheet of white paper and glass and set in a warm, sunny window until germination takes place. Then the glass should be raised sufficiently to admit air and the paper removed and placed between the box and the window or a width of cheese cloth may be interposed between the glass and the box to temper the sunlight until the little plants have acquired their first pair of true leaves when they will be able to endure more heat and air which should be steadily increased until on mild days the window may be opened that they may benefit by full sunshine and air. As soon as the little plants are an inch high, transplant into other flats, setting an inch or more apart each way, and grow on as before or until they again crowd each other, when they may be transferred to small two or three inch pots and the sand box until time to go into the ground.
1 Or a trench as deep as the completed pit and as narrow as can be handled may be dug to outline a pit of the required dimensions, and filled with grout, well tamped down; when this has had time to harden sufficiently, the earth may be removed from the center and the cement given a finishing coat, and the wall brought to the required height above ground by the aid of a frame of boards.
CHAPTER III
PLANTING SEED IN THE OPEN GROUND
Is important for it is just the form that most of the garden sowing will take. The sowing of seed in hotbeds and flats in the house is of much interest and importance, but the garden, for the most part, will go directly into the open ground, and upon the care and judgment with which the planting is done will depend the success of the season's work.
The ground should be in as good condition for sowing as possible—neither too dry nor too wet. It should, and this is of much importance, be warm. The best of seed will not germinate if sown in wet, cold soil, especially is this true of peas and beans, failures with these being almost invariably due to too much haste in planting or unfavorable weather immediately following. It is no unusual thing in a cold, late spring for these legumes to require repeated replanting and with the enormously advanced price of all kinds of seeds it will not pay to take too long chances by undue haste in planting. Usually it is quite safe to plant nearly all of the garden truck by the tenth of May at the north but the weather for the recent seasons has been unusual and much loss was occasioned by adhering too closely to an established schedule; so, if the season promises to be in any way, except for earliness, abnormal, it is best to go slowly and not trust all one's seed to an initial planting but to hold a little in reserve to replant unfilled areas. Cutworms, too, have caused much devastation the past few seasons—usually these are troublesome to transplanted things, mainly cabbage, peppers and tomatoes, but last year they destroyed beans and other plants impartially, causing much loss.
In planting a seed drill attached to a hand cultivator will be of great assistance as seed may be drilled in rows or dropped in hills at different distances apart so rapidly that the entire garden may be planted in little more time than it takes to do an hundred foot row by hand, and the drill will do it better, opening up the rows, sowing the seed and covering all in one operation. If, however, one is not possessed of this convenient implement one can do very well without by removing one hoe of the hand cultivator, or by reversing