Summer Meeting. 43 



EANDOM THOUGHTS O^ SMALL FRUITS. 



M. L. Bonham, Clinton, Mo. 



This winter lias been a test for hardiness in small fruits, and 

 although we hardly expect a repetition in this climate of thirty degrees 

 and more below zero, yet other things being equal, the hardiness of a 

 variety ought to have a prominent consideration. The raspberry, black- 

 berry, grape and in fact most fruits have suffered this past winter. I 

 find that young thrifty plants and trees have waitlist ood the cold better 

 than those that have been weakened by age, disease or bad treatment 

 Young, healthy, well cared for plants will withstand extremes in cold or 

 drouth, or disease, while a poor, weak one would be killed by either 

 cause. There is a maximum in all plant life, an up grade and a down 

 grade. It is useless to try to bring out a patch of small fruit that has 

 degenerated or that has absorbed the necessary food. The best plan is 

 to renew by growing on fresh ground, destroying the old plat and 

 planting to something else. The strawberry will generally be most 

 profitable if not grown more than two years on the same ground. The 

 raspberry will generally do well for four or five years on the same 

 ground before it deteriorates. The blackberry about the same. The 

 grape wdll do a little longer without changing, but to be successful with 

 small fruits, you should never reset on the same ground, the same sorts 

 of fruits, unless by rotation. Eesetting an old orchard, especially of 

 apples, is always attended with failure. Sorts differ so much in different 

 localities that it is difficult to make an intelligent selection only by ex- 

 perience, but we, to be successful, should profit by others' experience; 

 it is safer nine times out of ten to select old and well tried sorts than 

 to try new ones, even if they are puffed up, for the bubble will burst and 

 you will be none the richer, but wiser. Such experience is a dear 

 schoolmaster. The strawberries that do best for me are Michel's (if 

 gTo^^^l in hills), Cumberland, Triumph, Bubach, Beeder, Jessie, Gandy. 

 There are a few^ very promising new sorts that it would pay to test in 

 your locality, the Wm. Belt, Glen Mary, Clyde, Nick Omer, and perhaps 

 others. The raspberry has few sorts. I would recommend Palmer,. 

 Kansas, Onandaga, Gregg, for l)lack or tip sorts; of the red sorts, the 



