Culture of the Strawberry. 163 



common parlance in such cases is that the variety has " run out," 

 or degenerated, but the idea is a confused and ignorant one while 

 the healthy aspect of the plants fully proves the vigor of the 

 sort. 



The truth is, that in all strawberries of the foregoing classes, 

 although each blossom is furnished with stamens and pistils, yet, 

 in some plants, the pistils are so few that they can scarcely be 

 perceived; in others, there are scarcely any stamens visible. 

 When the plants bear blossoms furnished with stamens only, (or 

 in a large proportion,) they are of course barren: when pistils only 

 are produced in abundance, they are fertile. To have a bed 

 planted sd as to bear abundantly, about one plant in eight or ten 

 sliould be staminate or barren blossoming plants; the others the 

 fertile ones — for if the latter only be kept, they alone will also 

 be found unproductive. 



If any person will examine a bed of the Hudson, or any of 

 the large scarlet strawberries, when they are in blossom, he will 

 discover a great number of plants which bear large showy blos- 

 soms filled with fine yellow stamens. These are the barren 

 plants. Here and there, also, he will discover plants bearing 

 much smaller blossoms, filled with the heads of pistils, like a 

 small green strawberry. The latter are the fertile ones. Now 

 the vigor of the barren plants is so much greater than that of the 

 fertile ones, and their offsetts are so much more numerous, that, 

 if care be not taken to prevent this, they soon completely over- 

 run and crowd out the fertile or bearing plants, and to this cause 

 only is to be attributed the unproductive state of many beds of 

 the large fruited strawberries, which are in many instances per- 

 haps entirely devoid of fertile plants. 



The proper method undoubtedly is to select a few fertile plants 

 of each kind, plant them in a small bed by themselves, and allow 

 them to increase freely by runners; then, on planting, the proper 

 proportion could be made and kept up by the regular clipping of 

 the runners. 



Many of the fine English varieties of strawberry, (Wilmot's 

 superb, for instance,) are generally found worthless here. This 

 is owing, in some cases, to the ignorance or want of care of 

 those persons who export the varieties, in sending, often, no fer- 

 tile plants; in other instances it is equally owing to our negli- 

 gence here, in not preserving the due proportion of barren and 

 fertile plants. 



This peculiarity in the blossoms is very little known or under- 

 stood, even among scientific cultivators. It was first pointed 

 out to us by our esteemed friend, N. Longworth, Esq., of Cin- 

 cinnati, one of our most distinguished Western horticulturists. 

 Its truth we have repeatedly verified, and a slight examination 



