840 THE AMERICAN FARMER. 



a year without any particular effort except to keep them in the dark and where they will not 

 freeze. For many years we have had old cranberries in good condition when the new ones 

 were gathered. 



In setting vines on high land it is important that the roots should be set all over the 

 ground, and not in rows, and if the land can be mulched with sawdust, leaves, or any material 

 through which the little roots of the runners can penetrate, it will not only assist in keeping 

 the grass out, but save the runners from being scorched by the sun. Half a rod of land in 

 one corner of the garden, well cared for, will furnish fruit enough to supply an ordinary 

 sized family. 



If one has a pond that flows up several feet higher in the winter than in the summer, by 

 filling in the borders with sand a good crop of cranberries can be grown for many years, 

 without any expense after the first two or three years, except that of harvesting the fruit; in 

 such location good crops of fruit will grow on four feet of sand, and to our knowledge will 

 continue for more than twenty-five years without resetting. 



In such locations the water protects the vines in the winter, and where it does not leave 

 the vines until the last of May or the first of June it protects the blossom buds against the 

 spring frosts, checks the growth of grass, and at the same time gives to the vines just the 

 fertilizing material they require. He who desires to enter largely into the cultivation of 

 cranberries should not be satisfied with high land, or the borders of a pond, but should look 

 around until he finds a piece of land naturally fitted for the cranberry, and thus avoid heavy 

 and constant expense. When such location is found, it will be a meadow with a peat 

 bottom or never-failing stream of water flowing through it; the land so situated that it can 

 be covered with water in a few hours at any season of the year, and kept covered at least two 

 feet deep from December to May; also within a short distance of a sand hill. 



When a piece of land of this description can be found, it is cheap at any price under five 

 hundred dollars per acre, and even at five hundred dollars it will pay a very large profit if 

 set with cranberries. In preparing the land, it is best to remove the sod down to the peat, 

 which in most locations will be worth, for manure, more than the cost of removal. The land 

 should then be covered with at least four inches of sand; this can be done best and cheapest 

 in the winter, when the ground is frozen and the work of the men and teams is not so 

 pressing. The vines should be set in May as soon as the weather begins to be warm ; if the 

 water can be brought to within an inch of the top of the sand, the vines can be set with 

 greater ease, and will be much more likely to live; whatever may be said to the contrary we 

 believe it is always best to set vines that have roots. We have seen plantations set with 

 vines that had been run through a hay cutter, under the direction of one who believed that 

 the tops were as good as the roots, but the result was a complete failure. The vines do best 

 to set them in single roots, being first entirely freed from grass; the distance apart should not 

 be over six inches each way. If the water is just the right height, the vines can be scattered 

 over the sand and the roots pressed in with the fingers. Never set in rows two or three feet 

 apart, for by so doing the vines will always be uneven, because by the time the ground is 

 covered between the rows the vines in the rows become old, with many dead vines, but if the 

 vines are set all over the ground, by the second or third year the ground will be well and 

 evenly covered with young, vigorous vines. 



There is a worm similar to the plum curculio which sometimes attacks the young fruit 

 that grows on land that cannot be kept covered with water during the winter; as the perfect 

 insect winters near the surface of the ground, the water probably destroys it. It is very 

 important to keep the weeds and grass out the first two or three years; after that time, if the 

 land is well adapted to the fruit, but little attention will be required, except to keep the land 

 flowed at the proper time. As the weeds and grass must all be picked out by hand, the 

 first year requires considerable time, and the second year will require more time than the crop 



