The Redwood gazette. [volume] (Redwood Falls, Minn.) 1873-1940, 1877-05-31
Hygiene OF the Kitchen Garden.

people very greatly unuereStlm8teO. "A
few of the more common vegetables
planted and allowed to MAINTAIN an al
most unaided struggle with weeds and
insects is the ideal-or, if not the ideal,
the reaiization-of quite too many family
kitchen gardens. And yet, very few who
have space for it think of doing without
a garden, even of this improbable and
unsatisfactory kind. 1t furnishes some
things to give variety, though but little to
make up substantial dietary. And this
little often includes an undue proportion
of the most indigestible and innutritious
vegetables.
As compared with a well-stocked and
well-cultivated garden, how meager does
such one appear! The true ideal of q
garden raises it to much more impor-
tant level. 1t becomes one of the most
prolific of the sources from which well.
furnished table is supplied. 1t contrib
utes daily. or almost daily, the whole
year round, the most nutritious and
wholesome food, and contributes literally,
too. They who keep good garden, and
justly appreciate its value, need not be
haunted with visions OF tape worms, or
trichine, or any of the fearful diseases
more or less frequently resulting from the
use of animal food, and from the liabil-
ity to which no precautionary or pruden-
tial measures can secure us SO long as we
indulge in the use of such food.
!; To those who have not thought much
about it the quantity and variety Of food
70 be derived from good garden seems
almost incredible. Beginning in early
OF green's, O succession is kept up with
the early, medium and late kind of pease,
bush beans, beets, carrots, satisfy, Irish
and sweet potatoes, tomatoes, Lima and
other pole beans, green corn, melons,
squashes, pumpkins, the different varie-
ties of the cabbage family, early ana late,
turnips, parsnips, etc., among the ANIMALS.
2reuuifing but single season for their
production. Of a more permanent char
acter ale asparagus and rhubarb, which
fill 50 important places in early spring;
and also the delicious stIawberrics, rasp-
berries, blackberries, gooseberries, cur
rants, grapes, etc. The list might be even
much more extended.
The quantity of ground required to feed
q single OK and prepare him for market,
would, if cultivated as garden, feed q
whole family for an equal length of time;
while the nutritive value of the food SO
produced is beyond comparison greater
than the flesh of the OK when butchered.
And whatever we may think OF the
necessity for animal food, it must be ad-
mitted that the variety and delicacy of
the products of the garden entitle them to
high range among nutritive substances.
But the hygienic value of good gar
den is not to be estimated alone by the
quantity and quality of the food to be de-
rived from it. The pleasant OutOf-dO0r
exercise, with the pure air and sunlight
enjoyed for few hours daily while car
ing for the plants, would prove invalua-
bic to men Of sedentary habits, and would
dc much to- strengthen the shattered
nerves and bring rosy hues to the -pallid
cheeks of multitudes Of wives and daugh-
tiers made invalids BY confinement within
doors, and by working over hot cooking
stoves where the air Is loaded with vapUfs
iuseparable from the culinary srt az now
understood and practiced.
The mental hygiene, too, Is well worthy
of notice. The planning and the prepare
ton of the ground, the study Of the habits
of different plants and their proper cult
walton, the selection Of seeds, roots, vines
and trees, the care Of them during the sea-
son of growth, the harvesting and st0r.
ing of their products ct the. proper time
and in the best manner, the combination
of utility and neatneSs In all these and.
many other things, afford pleasant em-
.ployment for the mind, which j., Other..
wise too often burdehed with cares and
vexations much le isyurable % good
mental conditions. u I: 4 s1's.1
The satisfaction of plying hid ibis.
with the prvdnktS oesqn4al SeNA lAeof ~
care ia 4 Con0id<3IAtiOn Of NO tri6ing i'm.