354 MINNESOTA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 
HOW THE FARMER GROWS BLACKBERRIES. 
G. W. ANDERSON, LONG LAKE. 
The farmer usually plants his blackberries with the expectation of tak- 
ing good care of them and of getting bushels of this delicious fruit; but, 
alas, he has too many irons in the fire, so some will get burned. Small fruit 
not being with him a money crop, he looks after his field crop first, and, if 
he has any time to spare, his garden and fruit afterwards. Some are fort- 
unate enough to have a good wife to look after them and make them care 
for the garden first, but usually the small fruits are left to take care of 
themselves. Of all fruits that are grown there is none that will disgust him 
more than to run into his blackberry patch, and especially if it happens 
to be after dark, while trying to catch the pigs or calves that have hap- 
pened to get out of the pen. The blackberries, being left to themselves, in 
two or three years, if they happen to survive the first summer, which is 
seldom the case, will have grown into a perfect jungle, almost hog proof 
and boy proof. Then, if there should be any berries, he must wade through 
to pick them. Thoroughly disgusted with his failure and especially if he 
tries to cover the patch, as he has been told he must in order to succeed, 
he hauls up loads of straw or old hay, thinking that must answer the pur- 
pose, as he can not cover with soil, which he finds out to his sorrow. But, 
alas, when spring comes he finds the mice have girdled most of the canes. 
So for all his work and trouble he gets but a few berries. So, when he and 
his good wife review the failures and successes of their small fruits some 
long winter evening, he—not his wife—comes to the conclusion that he can 
buy blackberries cheaper than raise them. 
A lady near this city told me the other day that they had blackberries 
once, but had them all grubbed out, as neither she nor her children dared 
to go near them. ‘Would as soon have barb wire strung here and there in 
her garden as have blackberries there.” 
The blackberry will never be a popular fruit with the average farmer 
until they have been taught how to take care of them, and that they must 
be taken care of to be a success. There are exceptions, but where I have 
seen one fine patch, I have seen ten that have been almost as described. 
Nearly all farmers who have started to grow small fruits have a variety, 
so that they can have fresh picked berries during two or three months of 
the summer: First, the strawberry, then the red raspberry, currant, goose- 
berry, black raspberry and, last of all, the blackberry. 
The blackberry is a native of this state, and, no doubt, ere the foot 
of the white man trod its soil, when the fawn bounded over its hills and 
drank of its streams, the wild savage regaled himself with this delicious 
fruit. 
If there is anything that will make a western farmer’s mouth water, it is 
a sight of a fresh dish of blackberries sprinkled with sugar, and some rich, 
sweet cream poured over them. I have never known of a serious case of 
cholera infantum or other summer complaint where children or, even, adults 
had free access to fresh, well ripened fruit, and I consider the blackberry 
the healthiest of all. In behalf of your bright-eyed children and noble, 
self-sacrificing wives, I appeal to the farmers of the northwest to provide 
a generous supply of home grown fruit for thcir families. 
