68 STATE POMOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 



set in the open land, and will not stop growing in the least 

 when re-set. While in the beds they should have plenty of 

 water till a few days before they are to be taken up, when they 

 should be kept dry to the point of almost wilting. When taken 

 up they should be dipped into water and planted at once. Plant 

 them in the field in rows three feet apart, and from one and a 

 half to two feet apart in the row. Cultivate and hoe often, 

 allowing them to form very narrow matted rows, treating all 

 extra plants as weeds. 



Never undertake to prepare your ground in the spring till it 

 is dry enough to work up fine. The last of June is not too late 

 to plant strawberries in Maine, if planted the way here described. 

 As fine a bed of strawberries as I ever grew were planted on 

 the second of July. My advice is, however, plant as early as 

 possible in the spring. 



A little phosphate containing a large per cent, of nitrogen, 

 should be scattered along the line of the row and well raked 

 in, and after the plants are set, scatter a great spoonful in a ring 

 around each plant, about six inches from it. This phosphate 

 sowing should be repeated some half dozen times during the 

 growing season, but after you have got all the plants you wish 

 rooted, then a brand should be used that contains more potash ; 

 and at the last application, late in the fall, muriate of potash at 

 the rate of 250 pounds to the acre, should be used. Never sow 

 chemicals when the foliage is wet or allow any to long remain 

 upon it at any time. 



Keep up cultivation till the ground freezes, and then cover 

 with straw, thatch, swamp hay or moss. It is a little dangerous 

 to put moss directly over the plants, unless put on very late 

 and removed by the time that the frost is out m the soring, but 

 it makes a good mulch. Snow is Nature's protection, and of 

 course the very best while it is in place; but it is never relia- 

 ble along the seacoast, even in its season. Evergreen boughs 

 make the safest artificial winter protection. 



In the spring the everp-reen boughs must be removed, but 

 the mulching material mav be allowed to remain, except over 

 the plants where it should be loosened up, and where too heavy, 

 a part of it removed to the alley-ways. The whole surface 

 between the rows should be mulched for four very important rea- 



