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Show 4 Stick to Standard Vegetables By Frederic J. Haskin. 4 V WASHINGTON. D. C, March 21. "What to plant and how- many are the vital questions which millions of home gardeners are asking themselves and their wives these days. Seed catalogues, cata-logues, magazines and thg. neighbors offer of-fer a perplexing variety of suggestions. Avoid fancy, odd and unknown vegetables. vege-tables. Avoid thoso that are known to be difficult to grow and those that require re-quire a lot of room unless you happen to have a lot of room. In a word, be a conservative, and stick to the well-known well-known best growers. This is the timely advice of certain experts at the department depart-ment of agriculture who were consulted concerning tho new vegetables which are always put forward in the spring. Opposite the familiar red tomato on the inside cover of your favorite magazine maga-zine are the latest creations of scientific agriculture, such as the rat-tail raddish and the purple flowering onion, depicted In all their glory in six colors. The amateur gardener, or even the veteran of years is impressed. Tho homely potato is forgotten. The lure of the novelty is hard to resist. Thoughtfully the gardener turns the page and reals about a bean which Jack must have saved from the beanstalk episode. epi-sode. It is a triumph of pictorial art at least, this giant bean which will grow bushels of beans on a single stalk, and supply a whole family for a year. It seems strange that Hoover has -not discovered dis-covered this magic boan and ended the food shortage in Kurope- in a week. Tiie gardener is often further bewildered bewil-dered at this season by learning of interesting inter-esting foreign plants growing triumphantly triumph-antly in somebody's back ;ard; Udo, the Japanese equivalent for celery, has a number of times been exploited as a practical borne garden crop that "can be grown successfully from Maine to Florida." Flor-ida." One year many backyard farmers were temporarily converted to the cultivation culti-vation of truffles. You may succeed with any of these things, but the chanoes are a hundred to one you won't. Not only are freaks and fads to be avoided, according to the experts, but also these vegetables which are hard to grow. They say, for instance, that there is not much chance for amateurs to produce pro-duce a fi-ood asparagus bed, or to mature a crop of cantaloupes. Fancy vegetables are temperamental; so, also, is the average amateur gardener. garden-er. The combination is not often successful, suc-cessful, for inexperienoed enthusiasm and spasmodic bursts of energy are not conducive con-ducive to success with the more exacting exact-ing plants. Fancv vegetables and new discoveries are attractive, and the amateur farmer is inclined to try anything once. The danger is that a long struggle with an asparagus bed that finally yields tough asparagus, if any at all, is apt to discourage dis-courage the bravest amateur, so that he will never try his luck at gardening again. A :ong list of attractive hoodoos could be compiled by any experienced gardener, but every novice has visions of home-grown watermelons or cantaloupes, canta-loupes, two especially difficult plants for the beginner to grow. The small scale gardener is recommended recom-mended by the department of agriculture agricul-ture to concentrate on better need. Here is where gardening requires fine judgment. judg-ment. Otherwise, the gardener is taken in by descriptions of improved varieties where improvements aro chiefly imaginary. imagi-nary. When asked about this, the department de-partment of agriculture suggested that tho more extravagant the promises, the less likely they are to be fulf illed. "One year," said a department scientist scien-tist reminiscently, "a new Magic berry was widely and extravagantly advertised as easy to grow, delicious, and especially fine for making pies. A great many people peo-ple fell for the discovery, which happened hap-pened to be a weed. It could be cooked and used for pie filling, of course, but it was no rival of the standard berries as to flavor. It was a little harder to exterminate that weed than to cultivate it." Bv way of constructive advice to the honie gardener, the department of agriculture agri-culture says: "Plant your backyard patch to the best advantage." If you have only a 10x14 lot. don'i try a row of corn, two rows of potatoes and a few pumpkins. Corn is a fine thing for the home garden if you have space enough to plant a large number of hills so that pollenation will be successful. A short row of corn that will feed the family with a poor grade of grain on three occasions oc-casions is a bad investmont. Bettor buy corn from the grocer if your patch is very small. The same thing is true of peas. A 100-foot 100-foot row planted in peas will produce enough for only twenty-five individual meals, whereas the same Innd in beets, carrots or beans wlil yield a crop of much greater fond value. .Still, the gardener gar-dener usuallv likes the spnation of eating eat-ing peas fresh from his own garden patch, so peas are included in the list of advisable crops. Irish potatoes are yet another rrop which is worth the trouble of raising only if you give enough space for them. They are. however, sufficiently valuable to be allotted their share of ground. The Irish potato yields about 150 or 160 bushels bush-els to an acre. On a twentieth of an acre of ground eight bushels can be raised a little more than enough to supply sup-ply two people for a year. The average city garden is about 30x60 feet, though many patches are planted on a 10x20, or even smaller lot. For such lots, the following crops are recommended recom-mended by the department of agriculture. agricul-ture. The first eight best growers are beans, carrota, parsnips, salsify, turnips, tomatoes, lettuce and radishes. For second sec-ond choice are onions (not planted from seed), spinach, kale, cabbage, potatoes, peas and Swiss chard. Variety can be obtained in a small garden gar-den by planting an early crop of peas, beans, potatoes and cabbage, to be followed fol-lowed later by ""beets, beans, celery and spinach. Vegetables that require more time for growing can be planted in another an-other part of the garden. There is no argument against the home gardener's trying his luck with a. fancy vegetable or two if he has the inclination and a little extra space. The department of agriculture's agri-culture's warning is to gardeners who aspire as-pire to raise all their favorite dishes In a small patch of indifferent soil. While you stock up seed for the garden gar-den patch, the department suggests that a bean vine on the back or front porch is a practical ornament. Agriculturists prophesy that the American Amer-ican people have awakened permanently to the advantages of the home garden. Many people had fresh vegetables regularly regu-larly on their tables last year for the first time in their lives. On a 30x50 lot, ! carefully planned and cultivated, practi- i nally enough fresh vegetables (except po- j tatoes) for the average family can be j raised. i Seed for a lot of this sort costs $2 or i less. "If you think the home garden : doesn't pay, just try going to market ! with less than $3 in your pocket." is the department of agriculture's reminder of the cost of market produce. |