Vegetable Seeds
By the time these notes are read the first of the New Year seed catalogues ought to be in the post. Apropos of vegetable seeds, a correspondent writes to ask for the name of a good book on that side of gardening. There are many answers to that, but one of the best of them would be a reliable catalogue. To the many excellent English catalogues it would have been possible to add, in peace-time, the remarkable list of Vilmorin, Paris, whose collection of vegetables (beans alone running to six pages) was a revelation. This year the early ordering of seeds is of the greatest importance. It should not be forgotten that there is not only a shortage of onions, but of onion seed. In normal times a great quantity of commercial lettuce seed, particularly of early forcing varieties, came from France and Holland, and with it special varieties of carrot. Some seed merchants have already announced that certain varieties of onion will not be available for trade distribution, which may be the forecast of an acute shortage in spring. The popular campaign for seed-sowing will not begin before February or March, but any good gardener will be well advised, I think, to place his order in December.
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