SOME PRACTICAL EXPERIMENTS 227 



loam and one half well-rotted manure. Be sure the manure 

 is not fresh. A little bone meal is a good addition. 



Now plant the first row of strawberry plants ("ever-bear- 

 ing" are best, though they don't ever-bear). Put each plant 

 inside, spread the roots, and pull the leaves of each out 

 through one of the holes. Press the soil down firmly around 

 each root. Repeat the process for the other two rows; 

 fill the barrel and set say six plants on the top. That will 

 give you thirty plants, which should grow ten to twenty- 

 five quarts of fine berries, or more. The illustration makes 

 the holes twelve inches apart for big leafy plants. 



If there are any more, those will be you. Anyhow, you 

 will know a lot about strawberries at the end of the season. 

 Other things can be grown in the same way. 



Better than growing vegetables, or where dry land can't 

 be obtained, is to raise some crop like water cress that usually 

 comes from a distance. 



Often an otherwise poor season will help a specialty. 

 One year wet weather jumped the price of mint and it 

 sold at double prices. Hot, dry weather is required to 

 make it produce its best. 



Most of the mint produced in this country for peppermint 

 oil is grown in Michigan. More than 4000 acres are reported 

 from a single county. Mint oil is worth about $3.50 a pound 

 and costs about a dollar to produce. Nice bright dried leaves 

 sell for about 15c. a pound. 



The production of mint is sometimes as high as fifty pounds 

 of oil to the acre. The bulk of it is grown on marshlands, 

 which a few years ago were nowhere worth more than a few 

 dollars an acre. The mint is sent to the manufacturers, 

 where it is purified and made into flavoring extract or used 

 in chewing gum, etc. 



