COUNTRY LIFE
THE results of continued warmth, experienced, perhaps, rather more in the north than the south, have begun to prove disastrous, however agree- able. For example, I saw in Cumberland all that part of a field of marrow- stemmed kale not yet fed to stock, yellow with abundance of spring-like flower. That facetious term, " bolting," is a malady most incident to many vegetables. It is the particular habit of biennials which ought properly to store food one year in the hope of using it for the production of flower and fruit in the next. A small number of our carrots, those typical biennials, will " bolt " in most years ; but the blossoming of a large proportion of kale in February is " a thing imagination boggles at." Yet some sorts of this family are meant to flower in February, as we are reminded by a vehement fiscal controversy, now proceeding in farming circles and journals, over Cornish broccoli. The introduction of an Italian variety a generation ago set on foot a new Cornish industry, to rival the growing in that Riviera of anemones and daffodils. It has flourished, and this year the plants are even more precocious than usual ; and the com- petition with the vast imports from Italy and France is acute. How proud was Lord Baldwin years ago when he discovered that Cornwall had succeeded in itself exporting broccoli!
Previous page
