(JLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



167 



GROWING STRAWBERRIES ACCORDING TO 

 OUR STRAWBERRY BOOK. 



WHAT AN AMATEUK DID THE VERY FIRST 



TIME AFTER HAVING DIRECTIONS FROM 



THE BOOK TO GO BY. 



I send you a picture of my strawberry-bed. I 

 have tried to i-;iise them sexeral times, but without 

 success. 1 finally sent for your hook on straw- 

 berries, and went as nearly as possible by the di- 

 rections in the book. I put in a small bed and had 

 good success. We sold nearly a hundred dollars' 

 worth besides all we could eat. I am only an ama- 

 teur. I have the Sharpless, Crescent, Haverland, 

 and Gandy. I forgot lo mention that, while every- 

 bofiy else's strawberries were a failure in this local- 

 ity on account of drouth this year, ours were a suc- 

 cess. You can see in the picture we send that 

 Master Verner S. is as fond of entiiio berries as he is 

 of picki)ni them. J. L. Schlegel. 



Kichmond, Ky. 



It is very seldom we get a photo of a nice 

 strawberry-bed of sufficient accuracy to show 

 the foliage and the berries. Our good friend 

 Schlegel owes his success largely to the fact 

 that he is a photographer as well as straw- 

 berry-grower. The ground was put in order, 

 probably, exactly according to Terry's direc- 

 tions; that is, by turning under a heavy growth 

 of clover for the berries to grow on, the 

 ground being, of course, duly enriched, that 

 the clover might make a great rank growth. 

 After the clover is turned under, and the 

 ground worked up fine, and firmed, then the 

 rows are laid out 4 feet apart, and the plants 

 set out early in the spring. Then the runners 

 were trained so as to have the plants evenly 

 spaced all over the ground, leaving only suffi- 

 cient space in the paths to walk between the 

 plants. 



During the first winter the plants were 

 mulched with plenty of straw between the 

 rows, and with cut straw bet ween the plants; 

 then during the heaviest freezing weather just 

 enough straw was put over all to conceal the 

 green leaves. When frosts were past so the 

 plants began to grow, this surplus straw over 

 the plants was pushed aside just enough to let 

 the green leaves come out through them. 

 Spring rains do the rest in the way of packing 

 the straw down out of the way. The beds 

 were kept so clean that not a weed nor even 

 a spear of grass is visible through the luxuriant 

 foliage. Friend S. has evidently carried out 

 the plan to the letter, and every thing is just 

 right. No wonder he sold a hundred dollars' 

 worth from what he calls a " small bed." I am 

 sorry he did not tell us just how much ground 

 he did have. 



Now it is not too late, dear friends, to get 

 your own strawberry patch into similar trim, 

 or at least partly so. As soon as the snow goes 

 off, and the ground is .soft, get out every weed 

 and spear of grass. If you have not put on the 

 necessary mulching, get at it right away as 

 soon as the snow is gone and the ground is not 

 frozen. Nobody wants muddy berries. They 

 must be kept clean; and straw mtilching, or 

 mulching of sotnething else, is about the only 

 way to do it. We use to a largf extent coarse 

 stable manure. We can get this at about the 

 price of straw. Of course, it is open to the ob- 

 jection of weed seeds that will probably spring 

 up and bother you before the berries are pick- 

 ed. If, however, you do not expect to run your 

 strawberry-bed another season, you may let it 

 get pretty weedy while you are picking the last 

 of the berries; btit do not let any of these weeds 

 go to seed; and just as soon as you decide there 

 are not enough berries left for another picking, 

 plow the whole thing under— weeds, stable 

 manure, strawberry-plants, and every thing 



else. Then put in cabbage-plants, potatoes, or 

 any thing else you happen to want on the turn- 

 ed-under strawberry- bed, and then you will 

 have a crop for certain — that is, if the straw- 

 berries were manured as every strawberry-bed 

 ought to be. 



THE SODA SPRINGS NEAR ROBERT PHINNEY S. 



Along with the water, every now and then 

 there arose a great bubble of some kind of gas. 

 This gas is probably carbonic acid, although I 

 did not have time to test it. The spring water 

 is so strongly charged with gas as to give it 

 Quite a pungent tasie— something like the effer- 

 vescing springs of Manitou. It is so strongly 

 impregnated with soda, however, that one does 

 not. want to drink very much of it. There are 

 toward a dozen springs scattered along over 

 perhaps half an acre, and the water collectively 

 makes quite a good-sized little stream. It is so 

 warm that on a frosty morning quite a fog 

 hangs over the neighborhood of the springs, 

 and follows the stream of water for qtiite a 

 distance. The water is warm enough for a 

 comfortable bath; and if one or more of the 

 springs were inclosed even in a canvas tent it 

 would be a rare bathing-place. I have been 

 told by those who have tried it that it seems 

 almost impossible to sink in the water, as it 

 seems to buoy or push you up. This is proba- 

 bly caused both by chemicals contained in the 

 water and by the force with which it pushes 

 up through the- boiling sand. No doubt these 

 springs possess medical properties (that is, if 

 any of the warm or hot springs do. aside from 

 the matter of temperature); but it is so far 

 away from everybody that there is not much 

 prospect of their being developed very soon. 

 In this neighborhood they have mail only once 

 a week. How does that sound, friends, to those 

 of you who live in towns where you have mails 

 out and in, three or four times a day '? 



Next morning we made a trip -till further up 

 into the mountains. We crossed the beautiful 

 clear Beaver Creek spring water several times, 

 past the schoolhouse where Mrs. Phinney was 

 teaching; and finally away up in a narrow 

 canyon in the mountains we came to the resi- 

 dence of R Cassner. Before reaching the 

 place, however, I was charmed by a little bab- 

 bling brook coming up out of the canyon, and 

 actually running up hill— that is, if I took my 

 eyes for evidence. It seemed to run up hill right 

 merrily, too. for it babbled and flashed in the 

 sunlight, and hurried along as if it had lots to 

 do and could not waste a minute. Its final 

 destination was an alfalfa field, where it spread 

 its liquid treasures over the green and growing 

 plants. We followed the stream until it came 

 clear up to the door of the house. In fact, you 

 could hardly get outdoors and in without jump- 

 ing over it. A party of dogs met us at the bars, 

 and barked so loud and long that the people 

 could hardly make themselves heard when 

 they tried to welcome us. I couldn't quite 

 make out whether the dogs wanted to eat us 

 up or whether they were simply manifesting 

 their pleasure at seeing visitors. 



Right back of the Cassner cabin is a moun- 

 tain so nearly straight up for almost a whole 

 half-mile that it makes your head swim: and 

 away up under the very crest of the table-lands 

 on top we saw some clifif dwellings. While 



