The farmer and mechanic. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 18??-19??, 1909-05-11
Trucking Notes.

[ was in Florida the third week in
March and was. OF course. interested
in the truck crops. l saw big cabbage.
we'll headed up, not the little Wake
field. but big Drumhead and Savoy
caggage. This looked fine, but near
by | saw a field of potatoes. which the
owner said he planted the first of Jan
uary, and they had been frozen down
twice. [ took up some of the plants
and there was not a sign Of a potato
on them, and probably will be none.
| saw cabbage at Savannah and
Charleston that was ruined after
heading by the frost, nd then I saw
at New Bern cabbage that not been
hurt at all, and no danger at Norfolk,
and [ came to the conclusion that the
trucker has far more risk in spring in
the tar South than in North Carolina,
| saw big clu1npS OF oleanderS at
Savannah and Charleston with all
their leaves burned off. and at New
Bern the o~leanders were as green as
at midsummer, for | was told that the
temperature the last Of January a
only IS degrees at Savannah and %
at New Bern.
At Chadbourn and Mount Olive the
strawberries are in neat rows and we'll
cultivated, and fine fruit is grown. At
Norfolk | saw q great many Strawber-
ry fields that We're matted all over the
ground, and did not seem to have
been cultivated or fertiliZed. A Chad
bourn grower said he had often Won
dered what people bought the Norfolk
strawberries for; he supposed they
were used for extract for the soda
water fountains. Norfolk "
could grow as fine strawberries as
Chadbourn. but they do not, and I
suppose it is cheap rates that enable
them to sell the fruit.
The Irish Cobbler is the only potato
now planted about Norfolk to any ex-
tent. They say. too, that the second
crop seed from the Cobbler do not
give good results, such as they form
erly had from second crop Rose and
Bliss. The consequence is that they
have planted this years crop almost
entirely with seed from Maine, and
the reports come that these have rot
ted in the ground before growing. It
looks as though they will have to go
back to Bliss and second crop seed
| saw the place Of one man near
Norfolk who had 300 hot bed glass
sasheS at work, and they said that he
was making more money than any OF
his neighbOrs. He had, the middle of
March, thousands Of little veneer
boxes without bottoms, in which his
cucumbers n egg plants and toma-
toes were growing in the hot beds.
He had a large area Of frames from
which he was harvesting radishes and
lettuce, and as soon as these were out
he said that he would manure the
frames again, and set one of the Gu
cumber boxes under each sash, and
keep them protected until the wealth
Ell settled and then let them take the
open air and run over the frames. The
man had only about ten acres of land,
but [ was told that he makes $4,000
a year. And yet. ak to a North Car
DINA man abOut the value Of glass
saShes over cloth, and he at once says,
1T costs too MUCH" though in the
long run the glass is cheaper than
cloth. and makes far better crops. AT
New Bern one man told me that he
had sold his lettuce from under the
glass sashes, but that under cloth was
just coming in. Some day our ,4,orth
growers will realize the value
gIass.-W. T. Massey in Progress