Little, if any, work other than preparing soil, and manuring, is likely to be possible out of doors, but vegetables can be forced under glass.

Early Asparagus

Asparagus is not often forced in small places, but forcing is quite feasible for those gardeners who have a range of pits or deep frames. If the structure be heated by hot-water pipes, the only thing that need be done is to put in about a foot of manure, trample it down, and surface it with eight or ten inches of soil, in which to imbed the roots. If there are no pipes, double the depth of manure will be necessary. It should be forked about two or three times before it is put in the frame. Asparagus "roots" ("clump" would be a better word than " root," inasmuch as roots form only a part of the forcing mass, but custom rules us) are conglomerations of soil, fleshy roots, and central "crown." The latter is the thickening above the roots from which the shoots spring. A good forcing "root" should be not less than three years old, or six inches across. If the soil is moistened with warm water when it gets dry, and a temperature of from 500 to 6o° is maintained, sturdy shoots will soon appear.

Forcing Seakale

Seakale is totally different from Rhubarb. The forcing part is merely a single fleshy stem seven to ten inches long and one to three inches thick. Such stems can be grown in far less time than large roots of Asparagus - in fact, they can be produced in eight months if pieces about half an inch thick, and five inches or more long, are planted in rich soil in spring. It often surprises me that amateurs with small gardens stuff their limited space with coarse, strong-smelling vegetables like Brussels Sprouts, which any greengrocer will supply for a copper or two a pound, when they could grow so delicious a vegetable as Seakale. The roots can be forced in a frame or pit just the same as Asparagus, or a few may be put in a box, in moist soil, and stood in any warm, dark place.

Fig. 17. - Forcing Seakale. a. Roots in bed of soil. b. Growing.

c. As first planted for forcing. d. Hot-water pipes.

e. Stage on which more Seakale roots may be forced. f. Where to cut off the heads when the new growth is fit for use.

French Or Dwarf Kidney Beans

Among the several advantages which owners of heated fruit houses enjoy over their friends who merely own cold structures, is that of being able to push on useful extraneous crops. Thus, a person who forces early Grapes or Peaches by warming a house in January may also get a few early dwarf Kidney Beans, by sowing seeds in fairly large pots (7-inch or 8-inch) at the same time. The seeds may be two inches apart, and the same in depth. One thing to be very careful about is watering. The plants must be kept growing by using good soil and keeping it moist. If they grow feebly in poor, dry soil, a tiny pest called red spider may attack them, and should this get on to the Beans it may find its way from them to the Vines or Peaches. If it does, the grower will rue the day. It causes the leaves to become thin and rusty.