Small Fruits. 377 



escape some injury but think the water did much to save the crop. I 

 think injury from frosts can be prevented in this way, but one should wet 

 the plants and the ground thoroughly on a night preceding a frost, and 

 then begin to sprinkle them soon after midnight, and continue the work 

 until morning. For irrigating two acres, sixty rods of one and one-half 

 inch iron pipe is laid on the surface of the ground and taken up in the 

 fall. The tank is twelve feet long, six feet high and six feet wide, and is 

 elevated on a high bank so that I get fifteen to twenty feet fall to the 

 water used in the pipes. The cost of the plant was about $100. 



W, H. Jenkins, 

 Delaware county, !N^. Y. 



BIG STEAWBERRIES. 



Editor "The SouthAvest:" Mr. A. T. G-oldsborough, of Wesley 

 Heights, Washington, D. C, this year prxluced and exhibited some straw- 

 berries remarkable for size. The largest berry weighed four ounces and 

 was ten and one-half inches in circumference. The total weight of six 

 of these berriers, which filled a quart box, was eighteen and two-fifths 

 ounces. Some idea as to the size of them can be formed when it is 

 known that a one-ounce berry is rarely seen in market. These would 

 look like tomatoes. They were of a handsome bright crimson color with 

 dark flesh. The weight is attested by the acting pomologist of the 

 United States Department of Agriculture. 



Being curious to know the process of producing berries so large, 

 and having a pen-acquaintance with Mr. Goldsborough I asked him to 

 tell me how he accomplished this remarkable success, and with what 

 variety of plant. I give here a portion of his reply: 



"I might say, pull off all fruits but four or five, but the time of thin- 

 ning and which buds to remove, are essential to success." 



Again: "I thin out the croAvns; when four I leave two; but which 

 must I leave — the outer, or the inner, and how must they be cut out? 

 In other lines it is just as difiicult to give a set rule. 



"I use no artificial fertilizers for anything, and think them an 

 unmitigated curse to the farmer and horticulturist. But plants must be 



