Storing is a quick, cheap, and easy means of preserving fruits and vegetables. A supply of fruits and vegetables in a home storage enables a family to use these products during the winter when they are often omitted from the family diet. Many rural families produce most of their fruits and vegetables, while others purchase many of them. If the needed winter supply can be purchased during the harvest period and placed into the home storage, an appreciable saving may be made. An adequate home fruit and vegetable storage is a practical and economical investment for each farm home.

Successful storage of vegetables is not difficult and in most homes it merely means utilizing the cellar, attic, a large closet or other parts of the house, depending upon the character of the product to be stored. There are four major things to remember in storing vegetables; namely, temperature, ventilation, degree of moisture, and the quality of the vegetable.

Ice wells for cooling and storing milk and cream on the farm may be a satisfactory solution of the refrigeration problem on many dairy farms where the usual methods are too expensive or impracticable. The ice well “refrigerator” consists primarily of a pit in the ground in which a large solid cake of ice is formed by running a small quantity of water into the hole daily during freezing weather.

The primary object of storage is to hold a more or less perishable product in a salable and edible condition throughout as long a period as may be economically desirable. In the case of the potato, the storage of the late or main crop and of second- crop potatoes intended for winter or spring consumption or for seed purposes is of primary concern. The early or truck crop is usually sold as harvested, but there may be seasons when, owing to low prices, it might be found profitable to store the crop for a short period, or until such time as market conditions justify its disposal.

Last issue Ida Livingston talked about her discovery that sweet potatoes were exceptional feed for laying hens, year round. That led me to wondering how we might have the tubers for 12 months, so I looked up this building plan in our archives. With what chicken feed costs and what eggs WILL be worth in the coming years, a building such as this might be better than the cat’s meow.