198 SUCCESS WITH SMALL FRUITS. 



result from gross carelessness. The different beds may be 

 yards apart. In order to secure thorough fertilization, it is 

 not at all necessary to plant so near that the two kinds can 

 run together. In a large field of pistillates, every tenth row 

 should be of a staminate, blossoming at the same time with 

 the pistillate. The Kentucky seedling is a first-class stami- 

 nate, but it should not be used to fertilize the Crescent, 

 since the latter would almost be out of bloom before the 

 former began to blossom. Plant early pistillates with early 

 staminates, and late with late. 



Many ask me, " Do strawberries mix by being planted 

 near each other? " They mix only by running together, so 

 that you can scarcely distinguish the two kinds ; but a Wil- 

 son plant will produce Wilson runners to the end of time ; 

 and were one plant surrounded by a million other varieties, 

 it would still maintain the Wilson characteristics. It is 

 through the seeds, and seeds only, that one variety has any 

 appreciable effect upon another. Many have confused ideas 

 on this point. 



A man brought to the Centennial Exhibition, at Philadel- 

 phia, a pot of strawberries that attracted great attention, for 

 the fruit was magnificent. I suggested to him that it resem- 

 bled the Jucunda, and he said that it was a cross between 

 that berry and the Seth Boyden. This was a combination 

 that promised so well that I went twenty miles, on a very 

 hot day, to see his bed, and found that the crossing was 

 simply the interlacing of the runners of the two distinct va- 

 rieties, and that I could tell the intermingled Jucunda and 

 Boyden plants apart at a glance. Such crossing would make 

 no marked change in varieties if continued for centuries. 



The enemies and diseases of the strawberry will be 

 grouped in a general chapter on these subjects. 



