The Johnson City comet. (Johnson City, Tenn.) 1916-1917, 1916-04-13
GARDEN IS A BIG
ASSET TO FARMER
Many Have Found II Profitable
To Utilize Space for Pro.
ducing Vegetables
YARDS USED BY TOWN FOLKS
People Of the City Derive Much Pleas
ure From Backyard Gardening
Soil, If Well FertIIized and Worked,
viii Produce Good Results.

(By Chas. A. Refer, Division of Ex-
tension, University of Tennessee.)
The United States Department of
Agriculture is making a vigorous cam
paign for diversified farming in the
South. The Southern farmer is told
to grow his own meat, and the grain
and hay to feed it, to make his own
butter, and plant garden. The Won
der is that this advice should be nee
essary.
To buy meat and butter and vege-
tables while operating a farm would
seem a contradiction; but the fact re-
mains that even in Tennessee many
farmers buy meat and eggs, dairy sup
plies, vegetables and fruit, or theic
families go without these necessities.
The garden should be big asset on
every farm and in every town lot; not
big in size, but in profit. The success
full garden is a striking example Of
intensive effort. 1t should be small,
heavily fertilized, constantly worked.
In every small town in Tennessee
there are excellent gardens, whose
owners are as jealous of their reputa-
tons as gardeners as If they were so
many grand opera singers. 1t is an
achievement to produce the first peas,
or the earliest potatoes or the largest
tomato. 1t is a pleasure to send a
basket of vegetables to a friend, and
a satisfaction to have a constant sup
ply of fresh garden stuff for the table.
Here in Tennessee the garden is a
place for work during at least nine
months in the year. 1t should be plow-
ed or spaded in the fall, and a heavy
coat of manure should be turned deep
into the soil. Manure is plant food,
and great regulator of soil moisture.
1t is almost impossible to give a plant
indigestion by an oversupply Of food,
where the moisture condition Is right.
Manure heavily. Pillow OF spade deep
ly. Make the soil fine all the way
down before planting. And keep the
garden well cultivated after 1t is
planted.
Plant little of any one vegetable at
a time, and plant often. What is the
sense of growing a whole row of
radish or lettuce or cabbage, when
only Q tenth of a row can be used
while in fit condition for use? 1t would
be better to plant tenth of a row,
and in a week or ten days plant again;
two or three paintings of radish in
March or April, and two paintings in
late August or September gives rad
ishes enough; one tires of radish, and
the row that knew radishes in April
should be growing beans or okra or
tomatoes or melons in May. Snap
beans should be planted at least nine
times, at intervals of two weeks, If
beans that really snap are wanted
throughout the season. Tomato plants
should be set In April, and again in
June. Everybody should plant beets
for winter use in early August. Satisfy
and parsnips are best sown in early
June in Tennessee gardens. Cucum-
bers and cantaloupes will afford con-
tinuous supply if two or three plant
ings are made. Plant white pota-
toes in January or February, and In
early July. Sow onion seed In Jan
uary, and put In the culls from the
crop in September Make the garden
rich enough, and hoe without ceasing,
and one may plant something with
profit in every month from January to
October.
The garden that is continuously |
planted is continuously productive. I'll
is a big asset in town lot and farm. :
But the unweeded garden! Things
rank and gross in nature possess it |
merely" |