96 MASS. EXPERIMENT STATION BULLETIN 160. 



full bloom. The reason for this increase in the second year of spraying 

 is obscure, but the fact that it takes place is interesting. The fact that 

 the sprayed half of fertihzer plot 15, which was also sprayed for the first 

 time in 1913, did not show an increase in fruit production is contradictory, 

 but the fertihzer used on this plot may have made the difference. 



All the other plots treated this year, except D, produced less fruit 

 than their checks, and D showed only a slight increase. The untreated 

 plot C produced distinctly more fruit than its checks, while E showed a 

 decrease almost as great; the results with these two plots thus being 

 contradictory and not sufficiently marked to be of any apparent value. 

 As all the plots produced much less fruit in 1913 than did the surround- 

 ing portions of the bog, they should all, under normal conditions, have 

 shown a distinct increase in 1914 because of their partial rest from fruiting. 

 That they did not do so is good evidence that the spraying was not par- 

 ticularly beneficial and perhaps indicates injury from it. 



The smaller the berries the greater the number it took to fill the cup, 

 and if the table is examined with this in mind it will be seen that all of 

 the plots, except "1913," the sprayed half of fertilizer plot 15 and the 

 middle portion of plot A, produced distinctly smaller berries than did 

 their checks. The fertilizer accounts for the exception with plot A and 

 probably also with plot 15; "1913," as already indicated, was an excep- 

 tional plot because of its having been sprayed onlj^ one season before 1914. 

 The size as well as the quantity of the fruit on these plots seems, there- 

 fore, to indicate that general spraying is not a good practice. 



The spraying on all these plots was done with a 30-gallon wheeled- 

 barrel outfit, the mechanical injury to the vines not being very great as 

 a long hose was used and the outfit was in no case taken onto either the 

 sprayed areas or their checks. The berries were all picked with scoops 

 and measured in selected boxes of approximately the same size, the loose 

 vines being carefully removed by hand. 



The keeping qualities of the fruit from these plots and their checks 

 were tested, the period of storage extending from November 3 to Decem- 

 ber 30 with the late berries, and from November 14 to New Year's with 

 the Early Blacks. As in the 1913 tests, the berries were carefully meas- 

 ured in everj^ case. The results of these tests were not definite enough 

 in any respect to be satisfactory, perhaps because they were begun too 

 late or because the berries were run through a separator before they 

 were placed in storage, this not having been done in previous years. 



As already indicated, one-half of plot "1913" was sprayed during full 

 bloom to determine whether Bordeaux mixture, made according to Dr. 

 Shear's formula for its preparation for cranberry spraying, would do 

 serious damage if applied at that time. The figures given in Table 2 show 

 that this spraying did injure the blossom considerably, causing a reduc- 

 tion in the crop of about 13 per cent., if we regard the bloom as having 

 been equally abundant on both halves of the plot. As a matter of fact, 

 however, the more heavily blossomed half was purposely selected for this 



