PREPARATION OF THE SOIL. 15 
PREPARATION OF THE SOIL. 
Clear the ground of weeds, roots, and seeds of all 
kinds in preparation for thorough drainage, which in 
most soils should be attended to the first thing. The 
best drains are the earthen tile drains, from two to four 
rods apart, which should be so constructed as to be 
left open at both ends for the circulation of the air, as 
well as the release of stagnant water. A brush or coarse 
stone drain is beneficial as a temporary expedient. 
After draining, break up the soil as deep as possible 
with a subsoil plough, or by trenching twenty inches 
or more deep. The strawberry is so sensitive to 
drought and stagnant water that very little of the best 
land in our country can be exempt from draining and 
trenching, if we would receive in return uniformly 
large crops of fruit in all seasons. 
Inasmuch as the fruit is composed of so large a pro- 
portion of potash, soda, and lime—sixty-two parts in 
every hundred, as will be seen by the tables in this 
work giving the analysis of the strawberry and plant 
—we recommend next, that an application to the acre 
be made of twenty to thirty bushels of unleached or 
leached ashes, ten to twelve bushels of lime—either 
stone or oystershell—with two to three bushels of salt, 
which should be thoroughly mixed with the soil, if 
