STATE POAIOLOGICAL SOCIETY. " 97 



good deal quicker when the roots are shortened to that extent. 

 As I said, frequent cultivation is absokitely necessary, and the 

 more frequent the better. In dry weather such as we have 

 had this season we always plan to cultivate twice a week in 

 the beds which are in matted rows, and run the scufHe hoe and 

 the wheel hoe through the hills at least every six days. Fre- 

 quent cultivation seems to be the salvation of the plant in dry 

 weather. Cultivation should not be carried on too late. It 

 should cease as early as the loth of October. In that way the 

 plant gets a chance to harden its foliage a little better and to 

 ripen off for the winter. We don't very often hear of winter 

 injury to plants, because the snow and the protection we nat- 

 urally give them keep them from severe injury; but at the 

 same time if you get a big mass of foliage in the fall just at 

 this time and then put on a cover, you are more likely to do 

 the plants injury than if they were hardened off by stopping 

 cultivation early in October. In our climate we cannot depend 

 on the snow covering the plants. There must be some sort of 

 winter protection, like the common wild grass that we get on 

 the meadows, or leaves, or pine needles. Care should be taken 

 in the use of these things not to cover the plants too deep. 

 They are naturally hardy and need only enough protection to 

 keep the ground frozen in the spring, when we have 

 warm days (w^ien the ground thaws out and breaks) 

 and very severe nights. Freezing in March is what injures 

 the strawberry plants more than any other cause I know of 

 in climatic conditions. I have seen sticky ground that would 

 crack open an inch during that month, and of course the roots 

 of the plants have got to break, as the power of the frost is 

 very great at that time of the year. So keep in mind that the 

 idea of the mulch is not to keep the plants warm, but rather to 

 keep them cold during that early spring season. In our section 

 we generally uncover the plants about the first of April and 

 then we are very safe because the weather after that time can 

 be pretty well depended on. Our early fruiting varieties like the 

 Marshall I would recommend keeping covered a good deal 

 later than that to prevent early blossoming, because the Mar- 

 shall is a variety that is very easily frozen, and the blossom 

 starts earlier than any of the others. 



