STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 69 



James Vick's. I prefer corn stalks to anything that I can find 

 for mulching. 



President Smith. I would state that my friend Elliot took me out 

 to see Mr. Gilpatrick's plantation; I think it is certainly the finest 

 plantation of strawberries I have ever seen. He had taken a 

 great deal of pains and they were in fine condition. 



Mr. Grilpatrick. I have had hands who picked sixty quarts a 

 day and not less than forty, and I have never used a drop of 

 water. I have a pump so arranged that I could use water at any 

 time and init it all over the bed. 



Mr. Elliot. How fast could you pick those berries? 



Mr. Gilpatrick. I never tried myself, but I had a girl seven- 

 teen years of age who was out and picked without anyone's say- 

 ing anything to her, and she picked a quart in four minutes. 

 She got on her hands and knees, and they were right where she 

 could get a hold of them. 



Mr. Tanner. Mr. President, I would like to know if sowed 

 corn would not make a better covering than corn stalks. 



Mr. Smith. The objection would be that the stalks would lie 

 down so close to the plants that it would have a tendency to 

 cause them to ferment and injure the vines; the corn stalks 

 would make it a little more open, and I don't think the sowed 

 corn would be so good for the roots. 



Mr. Harris. I think there would be danger in using sowed 

 corn if three feet of snow should fall upon it before the ground 

 was frozen; when you woke up in the spring you might be minus 

 of your strawberries. I like corn stalks for mulching. The best 

 patch of strawberries I ever saw were mulched with hop vines. 

 The man ran out of straw, and he had a hop yard of an acre, and 

 utilized the vines for that purpose. Speaking of picking straw- 

 berries, it is pretty good picking a quart every four minutes. 

 My daughter went out last summer and picked one hundred 

 quarts in six hours and ten minutes of the Wilson Albany straw- 

 berry, and carried the baskets to the end of the rows and got her 

 baskets back. That was pretty good picking, and the vines 

 were not mulched, either; they were pretty good berries. 



President Smith. Isn't it a better way to mulch as Mr. Gil- 

 patrick does ? He mulches close up to the vines, especially on 

 the south side. I am inclined to think it is better to mulch close 

 up to the vines than to cover the ground and the plants so 

 much. 



Mr. Gilpatrick. I have never lost a plant where it was 

 mulched close up on the south side. 



