TECHNICAL INFORMATION FOR THE
VICTORY GARDENER

TECHNICAL INFORMATION IN GENERAL

  All citizens who are interested in producing food for home use, whether as individual families, in community gardens, or as part of industrial garden projects are urged to take advantage of general technical information as well as timely, particular reminders and recommendations, which are available either through county, local, or company Victory Garden Committees, or directly from the County Agent or Agricultural Extension Representative, the County Home Economics Extension Representative, or the Agricultural Extension Service at the state college or university.
  Precise information is available at all times from these sources, on best adapted varieties, sources of vegetable seeds or plants, plant growing methods, choice of site and soil when such is possible, soil preparation for planting, liming, manuring, fertilization, irrigation, seed sowing, transplanting, planting dates, probable yields of different kinds, season of maturity, planting plans, rotations, tillage methods, special cultural methods for each vegetable, insect and disease identification and control, proper maturity for harvesting, harvesting methods, storage, freezing, canning and drying methods, recipes for preparing, and nutritive value of the different kinds of vegetables. In addition, special bulletins and news letters are issued by the agencies named from time to time or when occasion demands, on such timely subjects as protection against insect pests or diseases which threaten to be specially destructive.
  To be sure of obtaining such timely information, the Victory gardener should consult his local Victory Garden Committee, should visit the garden center if one has been set up conveniently, or should request his committee to establish it if none is accessible, and should register his name and address with his Victory Garden Committee. Reference will be made later to Victory Garden registration, but for the present it should be emphasized that such enrollment implies no obligation on the part of the Victory gardener but simply enables his Victory Garden Committee to make its services more readily available to him, besides providing a census of war home gardening.

CHOOSING VARIETIES AND
OBTAINING SEEDS AND PLANTS

  The choice of varieties is dictated to some extent by personal preferences, but to a considerably greater degree by the adaptation of the different varieties to local conditions. For this reason, information from local, reliable sources in many instances is preferable to that from more distant agencies. In a few kinds, certain varieties of high edible quality though of greater perishability may be preferred for home culture, above the more durable varieties required for distribution through commercial channels. There is known to be some variation in vitamin content among different varieties, but as yet the information on this point is not sufficient to provide a basis for choice in any kind except possibly the tomato, of which the well-known earlier varieties are lower in vitamin C than the main-crop ones.