Use Good Seed: Another way to prevent disease problems is to use treated seed or certified seed and raise your own plants. If you buy plants be sure they are from a trustworthy grower. Avoid any plants with root swellings or lumps.

Gardeners are fortunate to have plant breeders who are constantly developing disease-resistant varieties. Study the seed catalog. It lists resistant varieties and although they are sometimes a bit more expensive, they are worth it.

Succession Planting: To get the most from your garden it's smart to practice succession planting. This means getting two crops from each garden row one which can be harvested in early summer, the other in fall. Often the fall garden is more productive, and fall-grown vegetables are usually of higher canning quality than those which mature during the hot dry periods of midsummer. Take beans, for example. They mature early and are finished by early summer. The vines can be dug and that same space planted with broccoli, cauliflower, Brussels sprouts, string beans or turnips.

Summer drought and early killing frost are two factors you have to keep in mind in planting the late garden. Midsummer heat can be offset by watering and mulching. To beat Jack Frost, concentrate on hardy vegetables like spinach, chard, turnips, beets, and any of the cabbage family, plus fall crops of lettuce.

Most of these vegetables can be planted as late as early July in most areas and still produce a fair crop. Long season crops such as tomatoes, peppers, or eggplants will continue to bear until frost if well cared for. Lima beans and okra will produce a partial crop when planted as late as the first of July. Garden peas such as Wando are a dependable fall crop.

Onion sets may be planted any time during the summer for green bunching onions. Seed can be sown in spring or early summer for a fall crop. Top sets from winter onions can be planted for fall use. Those not used may be left in the row and will usually over-winter for spring use.

In many areas beets and carrots can be left in the garden all winter if a light mulch is added. Parsnips are a welcome spring delicacy but take a long growing season so should be sown in May in most areas, then left in the garden over winter.

Mixing Crops

In our garden we prefer to mix crops rather than planting vegetables in blocks. The only exception is corn, which must be planted in blocks in order to get proper pollination. We scatter our four rows of beans between rows of lettuce, radishes, beets and onions, instead of planting all the rows side by side. Recent experiments show this cuts down on insect activity. That is the reason many people intersperse flowers in their vegetable gardens. We feel it is rather attractive to have a few plants of marigolds, nasturtiums, calendulas, or zinnias scattered among the vegetables.

Tools: Everyone needs a trowel or two, a spade fork and a hoe. You don't need a garage full of tools to produce a good garden. Small plots can be spaded by hand. Larger plots can be plowed and disked or dragged by your nearby farmer neighbor or large-scale gardener in the neighborhood.

A garden hoe is one of the best weedkillers you can get. Make sure it is sharp enough to clip off weed seedlings. Don't be in a hurry to buy power tractors or tillers until you're sure you want to do enough gardening to justify power equipment.

If you consistently plant a very large garden, a riding tractor with attachments could serve you well. When your plot is average or small a gasoline-driven, hand-operated rototiller type machine may be useful for fitting up a garden and keeping it maintained during the growing season.

If you like good exercise, a small plot is easily maintained through hoeing, hand weeding, and using a push cultivator.

A black plastic mulch can save you lots of cultivating and weeding. Don't use clear plastic because light enters it and enables weeds to grow. Place the plastic sheet flat on the ground, and fasten the edges down with soil or stones. Then make slits in the plastic. If you sow seed you can make a long slit and sow the seed directly into the row under it. You also can sow seed before laying the plastic. After plants are up a few inches, lay the plastic down lightly and cut slits or holes where the plants are so they will grow up through them.

If soil is moist when mulch is laid, plants will need little if any extra water because the moisture is trapped underneath. Sufficient water will seep in around the holes but even in very dry weather black plastic (and other mulches) hold water around roots. The plastic hastens ripening by increasing the soil temperature, and you don't have to worry about weeds, slugs or having to cultivate the plants.

Green Thumbers can turn to many sources to answer their queries about vegetable gardening: (1) Their county Extension office, (2) Current books on vegetable gardening, (3) Bulletins from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, (4) Farm and garden programs over radio and television, (5) State colleges of agriculture, and (6) Long-time gardeners in the area.