Part 2 (2/2)

=Marketing.=--The preparation of the crop for market involves some time and trouble. The shoots are cut every day. Some growers do the work early in the morning, and carry the bunches to market the same day. Others cut and bunch one day, put in water over night and carry to market the following day. Circ.u.mstances must decide which is best.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Acme Asparagus Buncher, with Knife Guard.]

If asparagus is to be s.h.i.+pped long distances, it must either be packed in open crates (like strawberry crates), or else thoroughly chilled by ice before starting. Otherwise, it will heat and spoil. The usual asparagus bunch is just about the size of a dry-measure quart in diameter, and from 6 to 9 inches in length. In fact, a quart cup or tin fruit can is frequently used in shaping the bunch. Home-made wooden bunchers are also in common use. The Acme asparagus buncher is the best, coming in two sizes. The asparagus is tied in two places with raphia or soft string, and thus makes a neat and attractive package. The b.u.t.ts are cut off square with a knife after the bunch is finished, and in this shape asparagus will remain fresh for a long time, if kept standing in shallow water.

In tying up the bunches the shoots are separated into two or three sizes. The small shoots are quite as good for food as the larger ones, but the latter always bring more money in market, which warrants the additional trouble involved.

=Salt.=--Salt is frequently used on asparagus beds, but not always.

Salt is sometimes an indirect fertilizer, acting upon fertility already in the soil, and having a distinct tendency to attract and hold moisture, but it has no direct fertilizing influence. It has a beneficial effect in helping to check the growth of weeds.

=Fertilizers.=--Kainit is an excellent thing for asparagus beds, as it contains a considerable percentage of sulphate of potash, which is a direct fertilizer. It also contains a fourth of its bulk of salt.

Ground bone, which contains nitrogen (ammonia) and phosphoric acid, is also a good thing to use on asparagus. It is very lasting in its action, and with the kainit makes a complete manure, especially in connection with the winter coat of stable manure.

Asparagus is a gross feeder, and will take almost any amount of fertilizer. Market gardeners, who raise the most and best asparagus, depend mainly on enormous quant.i.ties of first-cla.s.s stable manure; and this is probably the best fertilizer of all for this succulent and valuable vegetable.

=Tools.=--No special tools are demanded in asparagus culture, though such tools are on the market. Any long knife will do for cutting the shoots, although a very good knife is especially made of solid steel, and can be bought for 25 cents. The cut should be made just below the surface of the ground, care being taken not to injure other shoots just coming up. Crooked shoots often make their appearance, resulting from injury done by the cutting knife. Other causes, such as insects, hard soil, etc., produce crooked or deformed shoots. Asparagus bunchers, made of wood and metal, mentioned in the seed catalogues, are sometimes used, the Acme, heretofore referred to, being the best and cheapest.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Solid Steel Asparagus Knife.]

Any light plow with a wheel will answer for the asparagus bed. A light-weight harrow is also desirable. Where asparagus trenches are laid out and dug by hand of course a garden line must be used, in order to have them straight and uniform. The practice of digging deep trenches for asparagus still prevails to some extent in private gardens, but the farm gardener must use cheaper methods.

=Roots per Acre.=--With rows 5 feet apart and plants 2 feet apart in the rows, it is evident that each plant represents just 10 square feet of s.p.a.ce. Hence, about 5,000 asparagus plants would be required for an acre of land set at these distances; they are, however, often set closer than this, sometimes at the rate of 7,000 roots and over per acre. An asparagus bed containing 100 roots will supply an ordinary family.

BEANS.

Bean-growing in a small way is fully warranted in every garden, but on a large scale it is a different question, being somewhat a matter of soil and location.

=Food Value.=--The bean is one of the most excellent of human foods.

Its botanical kins.h.i.+p is close to the pea, and both are legumes. The leguminous plants, it will be remembered, have the rare ability of obtaining nitrogen through the tubercles on their roots, taking this expensive element partly from the air, and not greatly impoveris.h.i.+ng the soil by their growth.

Something of the food value of the bean may be learned by comparing its chemical a.n.a.lysis with that of beef. In 100 pounds of beans there are 23 pounds of protein (nitrogenous matter), while in 100 pounds of beef there are but about 15 to 20 pounds of protein. Peas are almost as rich as beans in protein, which is the tissue-building element of all foods, and, hence, it is easy to realize the fact that both beans and peas are foods of the highest economic value. They are standard foods of the world, entering into the diet of soldiers, laborers and persons needing physical strength.

It is generally safe to grow beans for the retail market of any town or centre of population, but to compete in the open wholesale market demands experience and good equipment on the part of the grower to insure profits.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Improved Round Green Pod Extra Early Valentine Bean.]

=Varieties and Types.=--The varieties of beans are well-nigh endless.

Some demand poles, while some are dwarf, being called bush beans. The influence of man has developed the bean into a vast number of different forms, which frequently show a disposition to revert or go back to some ancestral type, no matter how carefully the seeds may be kept.

The pole beans, in general terms, yield larger crops and bear through a longer season than the bush beans. The green-podded beans, as a rule, are more prolific and more hardy than the yellow-podded or wax beans. The climbers demand a whole season, and bear until frost. The bush beans are mostly employed where two or more crops are demanded per year from the ground.

The so-called cut-short or snap-short beans are those in which the whole pod, in its green state, is used for food. They are of both types, climbing and bush. The Lima forms include a number of distinct beans, differing greatly in size and shape and also in habit of growth.

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