CHAPTER X. 



FRUITS TO SUPPLY A FAMILY. 



THE question is often asked, " What shall I plant in order 

 to obtain a full supply of fresh fruit for a family the year 

 round?" It is difficult to give a precise list, as in some sea- 

 sons the crop may be many times greater than in others ; and 

 again, some will bear abundantly and others fail in the same 

 season. The following, however, will serve as an approxi- 

 mation : 



The earliest fruits, about the first of summer, will be straw- 

 berries. A selection of the most productive sorts, well culti- 

 vated, with the runners kept cut off, will afford several quart" 

 a day from each square rod for a month. Three or tour 

 square rods will, therefore, give an abundant supply for a 

 family. Four or five hundred plants will be sufficient for this 

 extent of ground. These will be followed by the earliest 

 cherries, and by currants, raspberries, and gooseberries. 

 Fifty bushes of each of the two best softs of currants, one 

 hundred each of two varieties of raspberries, and twenty-five 

 bushes of Industry or other good gooseberry, will, if well cul- 

 tivated, furnish an abundant supply. There are some other 

 gooseberries now as good or better. One dozen cherry-trees 

 will be enough. One hundred bushes of the blackberry will 

 supply several quarts a day for some weeks to ward the close of 

 summer. Apricots, early apples, and early pears, and a few 

 of the earliest plums, will commence the season of abundance 

 which, with the later varieties of these fruits, will last till 

 near winter. Winter apples and pears, and all the good-keep- 

 ing varieties of the grape, will continue the supply until 

 spring. Long-keeping apples, such as the Northern Spy, 

 Roxbury Russet, and other sorts, if placed in a good, cool 

 fruit-room or cellar, will continue often until the commence- 

 ment of the new supply of strawberries. 



To obtain this supply there may be five or six apricot-trees, 

 ten or twenty of plums, ten or fifteen of summer and autuuin 

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