22 



A B C OF STRAWBERRY CULTURE. 



There is one matter connected with varieties that each 

 grower, no matter how few he has, should know about. Each 

 strawberry seed has a pistil through which it must be fertilized 

 to come to perfection. The clump of pistils makes the oval 

 central part of the flower, as seen in Fig. 4. The pollen which 

 does the fertilizing is given off by the stamens, which number 

 some 30, more or less, in a flower. These can be seen in Fig. 

 5, growing out from among the pistils. 



The stamens are the male part of the flower, and the pistils 

 the female. Some varieties produce flowers having both sta- 

 mens and pistils. These are called " staminate," or perfect 

 varieties. Fig. 5 shows such a flower. Varieties having flow- 

 ers like Fig. 4 are called " pistillate," or imperfect. The cor- 

 rect names for these are staminate and pistillate ; but the 



FIG 4. 



FIG. 5. 



AN IMPERFECT BLOSSOM. A PERFECT BLOSSOM. 



farmer, or young beginner, will remember better if they are 

 called perfect and imperfect, and hence we will make use of 

 these terms only, in this book, to save all confusion. Perfect- 

 flowering varieties, such as the Charles Downing or Jessie or 

 Cumberland, can be grown alone. They have both stamens 

 and pistils, and fertilize themselves. Imperfect ones, such as 

 the Bubach No. 5, and Haverland, must have some perfect 

 plants near them to fertilize them. This matter of sex in 

 strawberries was not understood until quite recently. It is 

 claimed that Nicholas Longworth, of Ohio, was the first to dis- 



