36 A B C OF STRAWBERRY CULTURE. 



cut all these runners off as fast as they appear, in this latitude, 

 until the latter part of July (this for farmers, not small-fruit 

 growers). Cut the runners as soon as they start. Do not It t 

 them exhaust the plant by growing out long, before they are 

 cut off. Some one should look over the patch once in four or 

 five days, and cut off all blossom-stems and runners. I use a 

 pair of common shears for doing this. 



Now, this gives you a chance to cultivate and hoe rapidly, 

 and get the weed seeds in the surface soil about all sprouted 

 and killed. After the runners start it is more work to cultivate 

 and hoe, and keep the ground clean. After harvest you will 

 have more time ; then let the runners grow. Before they take 

 root I would go through the patch occasionally and spread them 

 out around, something like the spokes of a wheel, the old plant 

 being the hub. A clod or a little dirt placed on them will hold 

 them in place, if they are obstinate, until they get rooted. 

 The object of this placing, of course, is to get plants all over 

 the ground, instead of letting them grow five times too thick 

 in some places and none in others, as they often would natural- 

 ly. It is strange, but the first year we grew strawberries I knew 

 nothing about this helping of the runners to cover the ground. 

 I had not seen a word about it in the books, nor heard a word 

 about it at the institutes, where many men had told all about 

 strawberry-growing. Our quarter of an acre had made a splen- 

 did growth ; but the runners had gone out in bunches, or ropes 

 (pulled around together by the cultivator sometimes), many 

 times too thick and much of the ground was bare. Just at that 

 time my friend J. M. Smith paid me a visit. He told me how 

 to fix those runners, and the young folks worked for days trans- 

 planting them, as they had got rooted somewhat, and soon had 

 our bed in shape to do its best. I said to my friend : " Mr. 

 Smith, how is it that I hever heard you speak of this at an in- 

 stitute, when you were telling us how to grow strawber- 

 ries?" 



" Why," he says, " I was talking to farmers, and I did not 



