WINTER PROTECTION. 29 
WINTER PROTECTION. 
Our experience is in favor of a slight winter pro- 
tection. It costs comparatively no time or expense, on 
the approach of severe winter weather, to hastily scat- 
ter a thin coat of straw or old leaves over the plants; 
and they come out in so much better condition in the 
spring, and even the hardiest kinds bear so much bet- 
ter crops for it, that we never neglect it. Like mulch- 
ing, almost any thing free from weeds, that will not 
smother them or mildew, will answer the purpose, but 
clean straw is preferable, except they need the decay- 
ing leaves. 
Some years ago, we had an aged neighbor, who 
stood almost unrivalled in the cultivation of the straw- 
berry. One season he set out, on the first of July, 
about one-fourth of an acre of fine Hovey’s Seedlings. 
He almost constantly and carefully worked among 
them with the hoe, the rake, and water-pot, and I 
never saw a plot of so fine strawberry-plants as these 
had become on the approach of winter. 
The old man was “very much set in his way,” and 
among the things his creed discarded, was mulching 
strawberries; so, against my repeated remonstrances, 
he left them for the winter without mulching, with his 
