WARSAW HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 403 



Mr, Berry — Every man who has even a village lot should grow 

 the strawberry. It requires very little ground and but little time, 

 and adds much to the health and pleasures of the family. 



STRAWJJERRIES. 

 BY C. B. KOCKWELL. 



Stawberries are grown both for pleasure and profit. Those who 

 grow them for home use do it for pleasure, while those who grow 

 them on a larger scale are intent only on profit. In either case the 

 demaud is for large, handsome beri-ies. How to get them every 

 year, wet or dry, is more often asked than answered. It never will 

 be answered correctly, if those who grow them do not experiment in 

 different ways, and then give the result to others through the press, 

 or such societies as this. 



I am not a large grower, and have had only four or five years 

 experience, but have tried hard to learn something of their nature, 

 tlieir requirements, and their ability to produce good crops under 

 favorable circumstances. I am fully satisfied that they require good, 

 rich land, that is drained sufficiently to remove all surplus water, to 

 prevent the ground from getting hard and dry. We all know that 

 the first and second pickings are much larger and finer than the last 

 pickings. Why is this? Is it not because the plants in maturing 

 the fruit draw heavily on the moisture of the ground, which becomes 

 exhausted? Wliat is the cheapest remedy for drouth? M}^ answer 

 is mulch. Cover one-half of the ground four inches deep with mulch 

 and it will never dry out. When the plants cover all the ground, 

 you can not mulch them sufficiently to retain moisture without 

 smothering them. 



In the spring of 1884 I planted two-thirds of an acre to straw- 

 berries and have devoted it to experiments. The varieties are Cres- 

 cent, Wilson, Sharpless, Honey Dev;', Longfellow, Glendale, Man- 

 chester, Cumberland Triumph, Black Defiance, Miner, Russell Pro- 

 lific and Warren. The land was new timber land upon whicli no 

 crop had ever grown. It was upon a high elevation sloping to the 

 southwest. They were planted in rows four feet apart and fifteen to 

 eighteen inches apart in the row. They were plowed with a culti- 

 vator each week through the months of May, June and .luly; also 

 hoed three times. When the season closed — say December 1st, 1884, 

 they were in nice matted rows two feet wide, leaving a space of two 

 feet between the rows of nice clean ground. In March, 1885, seven- 

 teen rows of this clean ground were covered with corn stalks to the 

 depth of three to four inches; eight rows with old sawdust, two 

 inches deep, and seven rows with leaves, from two to three inches 

 deep. Through the spring of 1885 a few weeds made their appear- 

 ance in different parts of the ground, but these were promptly pulled 

 up. 



