28 ABC OF STRAWBERRY CUI/TURE. 



four feet apart, and the plants two feet in the row. This is 

 about the usual distance apart for matted-row culture. Now 

 go to the cellar, or to where you may have heeled in your plants, 

 with a pail half full of water. If it is a cold day, warm the 

 water slightly by putting in a little that is hot, until it feels 

 comfortable to the hand. This is for the comfort of the one 

 setting out the plants. Next open your plants and put forty or 

 fifty in the water, being sure that all roots are under ; and if 

 the tops are too, it will not matter. Cover the rest of the plants 

 from the air again. You are now ready for setting. 



You can make the holes to put the plants in with either a 

 garden-trowel or a brick-layer's trowel. But I found it easier 

 to take my narrow four-inch spade (English ditching-spade), 

 stand on one side of the row, push the spade down about five 

 inches, with the back to the long mark, and the front toward 

 me ; work it back and forth once, and then pull it out with an 

 upward and sidewise pull. This makes a hole about four inches 

 deep, with a nearly perpendicular bank in line with the row. 

 A man can throw out the holes very rapidly in this way. You 

 can make a similar hole with a trowel, of course, but not near- 

 ly as easily. Next take one plant from the pail of water ; 

 spread the roots out fan -shaped, as in Fig. 3, and with the left 

 hand hold this plant against the perpendicular side of the hole. 

 With your right hand take your trowel and throw two or three 

 inches deep of moist earth against the roots. Then press the 

 earth firmly against the roots, using both hands on the trowel. 

 Fill the rest of the hole with mellow earth, leaving it loose. 

 Never let the strawberry-roots get dry, nor put dry earth direct- 

 tool house we have a machine something like a wheelbarrow with a wheel 

 nearly a yard across. Movable pins are set in the rim of this wheel. It 

 is wheeled over the line like a wheelbarrow. Now, if you walk on your 

 clothes-line as you go over, you will make a plain mark, and the pins will 

 space it accurately. I think a common wheelbarrow will answer very well 

 by winding some wire or tying a cord around the felloe and tire, say on 

 each opposite side of the wheel ; that is, supposing you can get a wheel- 

 barrow with awheel of such size that half the circumference will be the 

 distance you need the plants apart. We mark out our ground by means 

 of a two-horse marker which will be described at the close of this book. 

 A. I R. 



