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HOME FRUIT GROWER 



The old-fashioned and lazy way of growing Strawberries was to lay 

 out a bed and let all the plants produce as many runners as they 

 "wanted to." Result: smaller and smaller and fewer and fewer 

 berries. The advance from this primitive way is the matted-row 

 system (!) in which the plants are allowed to form an unbroken ribbon 

 two to three feet wide from end to end of the plantation. This 

 "method" is still popular in field culture. 



An improvement on it is the hedge-row system for which the 



plants are set about two 

 feet asunder in the rows 

 which are three feet apart. 

 Only two runner plants 

 from each of the plants set 

 are allowed to take root 

 one on each side of the 

 parent plant and in the 

 line of the original set- 

 ting. Thus in the com- 

 pleted row the plants 

 will stand eight inches 

 asunder. No other run- 

 ners are allowed to take 

 root. Advantages of this 

 system are that the plants 

 become large, strong and 

 able to bear heavy crops 

 of berries, which average 

 much larger than those of 

 the matted row. 



In the hill system the 

 plants are set either in 

 checks from 18 to 24 

 inches apart so they may 

 be cultivated in both 

 directions, or 15 to 18 

 inches apart in rows 24 to 

 30 inches apart. In these 

 cases no runners are al- 

 lowed to take root except 

 when new plants are 

 needed for making a new 

 bed. The result is very 

 large, sturdy plants, which 



Fig. 129. Potted Strawberry plant with earth 

 washed away to show root development 



