80 ON THE CULTURE OF THE CRANBERRY. 



recommended by some persons as a good substitute for the 

 cranberry", and on that account worth cultivation, but we have 

 not found it so, the fruit is very acid and bitter, containing a 

 large oblong nut. It is, in our opinion, a shrub much more 

 ornamental than useful. The cranberry can be successfully 

 cultivated in any good soil, not absolutely dry. It prefers a 

 moist soil, and still better a sandy peat. In tlie selection of 

 plants for the purpose of cultivation, we should choose those 

 growing in low grounds, near the upland, in preference to those 

 found in wet, mossy meadows. We think the autumn a fa- 

 vourable season for transplanting the cranberry, as they can 

 more readily be taken from low wet lands. In removing the 

 plants, it is best to take up a sod of earth with them, carefully 

 picking cut the grass. These may be set in a bed, prepared 

 like one for strawberries, in rows twelve or eighteen inches 

 apart, and as the vines extend by sending out runners, they 

 should be covered with earth to cause them to take root. Care 

 should be taken to keep the bed free from weeds and grass. 

 The plants of the cranberry under cultivation, need protection 

 in winter. This, it will be recollected, they always receive in 

 their wild state in the meadows, by the overflowing of them 

 by water. They are best protected by covering them with the 

 boughs of some evergreen tree or shrub. I prefer for this pur- 

 pose the prostrate branches of the juniper, ca,lled by some per- 

 sons ground hemlock. When this cannot be obtained, meadow 

 hay, sea weed, or litter may be used. When the vines are 

 covered with the boughs of some evergreen tree, the fruit can 

 be kept on them in a very fresh and excellent state, during 

 winter, and used as required. I was somewhat surprised to 

 find my cranberries the past season, infested by an insect un- 

 known to me. These, resembling a worm or maggot, were 

 discovered in the berries when about half grown, eating out its 

 pulp, and destroying, I should think, half of my crop. Sever- 

 al of the cranberries containing worms were sent to Dr. Thad- 

 deus W. Harris, the distinguished entomologist, who, in reply, 

 informed me that he found the insects to resemble closely the 

 well known "apple worm" and adds, the question of their 

 identity, however, can be settled by keeping them, till they 

 undergo their transformations. 



