REMOVE THE OLD RASPBERRY CANES. 



and from five to six pounds on very rich 

 soil. It is important to plant early ; cer- 

 tainly before the close of the first week 

 in May. The rows should be from 

 twelve to eighteen inches apart. If there 

 are any blank spaces, they should not 

 be filled in with tomatoes, cabbages or 

 other large growing plants. 



As to weeding, Mr. Gregory said— Be 

 sure to weed just as soon as a row can 

 be seen. It is a good plan to sow rad- 

 ish seed with the onions, that the rows 

 may be distinguished more plainly. If 

 two or three rainy days come, this means 

 an extra weeding. He had tested twelve 

 different sorts of weeders and liked the 

 horizonal best. One kind (which he 

 thought well of) weeds two rows at a 

 time. There is one, called the finger- 

 weeder, which gives the operator very 

 complete control over his work. With 

 a sliding weeder there is a danger of 

 cutting or bruising the bulbs. It is an 

 excellent plan to double slide them as 

 we go along, first close to one row and 

 then close to the other. Thev should 



be weeded from five to seven times dur- 

 ing the season. 



For the onion maggot, Mr. Gregory 

 had found hens and chickens an effec- 

 tual remedy. A hen and a brood of 

 chickens will take care of from an acre 

 to an acre and a half Gas lime has 

 been found effectual, but it abounds in 

 chlorine and must be used with care. 



In harvesting green ones should not 

 be mixed with dry ones. When most of 

 the tops are down there is danger of 

 their re rooting. On highly manured 

 land they will be ready to harvest earlier 

 than land not so much enriched. A 

 cultivator with a scraper attached is a 

 good thing to clean the bed with. He 

 freezes a part of his crop, piling them 

 fifteen inches deep and from fifteen in- 

 ches to two feet from the wall of the 

 building, the space between the wall and 

 the onions being filled with hay ; they 

 are then covered two feet deep with hay. 

 They must not be touched or handled 

 while frozen. For marketing they should 

 be evenly assorted ; many small ones 

 cause extra loss in price. 



REMOVE THE OLD RASPBERRY CANES. 



OME advocate the leaving of 

 the old raspberry canes after 

 fruiting — claiming that they 

 are not only beneficial in pro- 

 tecting the young bushes during the 

 winter, etc., but that their mission is not 

 really filled duriug the year, holding that 

 the next year's crop is impaired if bushes 

 are removed before spring. Now the 

 former claim may be all right in some 

 locations where the winters are extreme, 

 and where a deep snow is beneficial, as 

 the cane will hold the snow and aid in 

 keeping the young growth from being 

 broken down, but the latter we cannot 

 see. When a bush has borne its fruit 

 and is dying off, as all strawberry bushes 

 do, then we advise making a business of 

 cutting out all the old canes and burning 

 them. Do not put them in a pile or 



throw into the wood lot. Why this care ? 

 To explain — Our raspberry fields were a 

 pleasant sight to see in the early summer, 

 but before their fruit was ready to pick, 

 the bushes commenced to show signs of 

 sickness, and the fruit ceased to grow, 

 and in instances dried up. In examin- 

 ing the old wood we found out the cause, 

 four-fifths of the canes were infested with 

 the horer, from one to ten being found 

 in each cane ; these pests were in differ- 

 ent stages of development, many ready 

 to come out and start business on the 

 young wood for another season, while 

 some resemble ant's eggs. And this in 

 the heart of the cane, of course, had 

 taken the vitality out of the bush ; it is 

 needless to say that every old bush was 

 speedily cut out and burned. — Green's 

 Fruit Grower. 



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