380 MINNESOTA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



Mr. C. L. Smith: A half inch of slough grass is about as 

 much as they will climb through. 



Mr. Wright: My experience with straw has been that the 

 wheat will come through. I have to buy it and take it where I 

 can get it, I had one part of my bed practically smothered 

 out. I did not mow it off — I tried a little of it. I now use 

 slough hay and that gives me the best results. It is clean in. 

 every way, and I also use it between the rows. 

 Mr. Gregg: You like the system of mulching? 

 Mr. Wright: Indeed, I do. I could not get along without it. 

 I have been trying to grow strawberries for five or six years, 

 and this is the only year when I raised strawberries that I 

 made them pay. 



Mr. EUergodt: I had the best success in burning the mulch- 

 ing. My practice is to run the mower over the strawberry bed 

 and cut the tops off and then burn off the bed, 



Mr. Hartwell: That will do if you have a quick wind. 

 Mr. EUergodt: Oh, no, that makes no difference; sometimes 

 I go over it a second time. 



Mr. C. L. Smith: We always have wind enough in Minne- 

 sota. (Laughter.) 



Mr. EUergodt: I have succeeded very well every year, and I 

 get no weeds. 



Mr. Hartwell: That matter of burning has another good 

 point; we get rid of the leaf roller. 



Mr. 0. L. Smith: Sometimes it destroys the roots, and some- 

 times it is all right. 



The President: Some of you are talking about raising 

 strawberries under very different conditions from Mr. Gregg. 

 He is talking for the frontier out there on the couteau, where 

 farmers have any amount of straw to burn, where they can 

 have plenty of straw to mulch. This is a very valuable lesson 

 for this society to promulgate and teach to those farmers out 

 in the prairie country. They do not know how to grow any- 

 thing except hogs, wheat and corn. They do not know how to 

 furnish their tables with strawberries, and if they could get at 

 this idea of growing strawberries for their tables, as it has 

 been proven it can be done, then I think this is something of 

 practical value that farmers want to know. 



Mr. C. L. Smith: That is just the point; that is the reason I 

 spoke of the slough hay mulching. This matter is all to be 

 printed in our report, and we do not want to make a mistake. 

 On the western prairie, on the dry prairie with an abundance 



