The Princeton union., 1892-05-05
The FARM AND HOME.
a NOVEL METHOD OF BANKING
55 UP CELERY.
Growing Oats on Rich soil-Hiring Help
Burning Old Potato Tops-skim
Milk Calves es-Farm Notes
and Home Hints.
Banking Up Celery.

Banking Up Celery.
The most laborious operation in the
raising OF celery comes in blanching
1t. Various devices have been in
vented to lessen the labor, such as the
use OF tile. paper boards, and so
forth; but there arc objections to all
OF these and one is the expense of
using them on a large scale. Some
times. in a small garden they do
nicely. Another objection to such
things is that when it comes cold,
freezing weather: as twill sometimes
before the celery can be put away for
winter with such slight covering the
plant will almost Invariably freeze.
not only the tops. but the stalks, and
then the injury is serious. And, as a
rule, the celery will rust much more
with other covering than it will with
earth. So whatever may be done in
special cases. we have to come back
to the banking up with earth for the
larger part of the celery that is
grown. .+,-r .
Now anything that will tend to
Tighten this job will be received with
favor, l know. says a writer in the
Ohio Farmer. Here at the station,
for the past three years we have been
raising our celery in beds about four
feet wide, and the plants six inches
by one foot apart This method, by
the way possesses some advantages
that are not gained by the usual way
OF planting in rows. The way of
handling: as thus described by we'll
known writer on rural subjects 'the
gardener how gets on his knees strad-
ding the row. and gathering up all
the stalks OF one plant after another
IN his left hand, packs the soil firmly
around with his right to retain them
IN a compact and erect position"-
seemed to be out of place in our beds.
so we tried string. by winding once
around each plant and then going on
to the next, keeping the string taut
enough to hold the stalks in place,
This was decided improvement over
the way OF holding the stalks in place
by earth until the rest of the soil was
put in, but when it came to taking the
string off the soil would be tramped
around the plant and the leaves and
upper part of the stalk would be torn
OH, and tho time it took in removing
it. made us almost want to go back to
the way of holding it up with our
hands. All sorts of suggestions were
made to get rid Of the trouble of TAX
ing off the string until someone
thought that paper string might do.
and it would rot off and not hurt the
plant.
In order to get such string we had
to hunt all over the city of Columbus.
1t seems to have gone out of use, but
we finally found what we wanted.
After getting it. we put it on several
thousand plants and then waited to
see if any injury was done. When
the plants awere taken out for the win
ter it was found that very little injury
was done. and this happened oy the
careless putting on of the string. The
plants were held in position by string
uutil rain came and settled the dirt
around the plant and wet the string
enough so it would give way to the
growing plant. Some of the plants
we gave second banking before the
string gave way and let the plant
spread.
lhave helped try a good many in
ventions but never had any that
worked so we'll from the start as this
one did. We invented a little device
for putting the string on. First we
held the ball in our hands but this
was inconvenient So one day went
into the shop and took a tomato can
and punched hole through the bot
tom of it, nailed it to a stick, and
then with piece of pantaloons' sus-
pender. with the buckles, fastened it
to the right arm above the elbow, and
at the wrist letting the string run out
at the bottom of the can and between
the thumb and front finger. With
this one can wind celery all day, if
his back does not get to aching too
bad. This is all the drawback have
found to it yet %