Tie Canadian Horticulturi^ 



ol. XXXI 



MAY, 1908 



No. 5 



Money in Growing Strawberries 



m 



THERE are few lines of legitimate 

 enterprise that offer anything like 

 so great an opportunity to the man 

 or woman of moderate means seeking 

 an independent livelihood as does the 

 growing of strawberries for market. 

 The demand for first-class strawberries 

 never is supplied, and prices for high- 

 grade fruit are almost universally high 

 both in Canada and the United States, 

 offering a fine inducement to enterpris- 



rg folk to engage in the business. 

 It is difficult to believe, sometimes, 

 me wonderful things that are being done 

 by strawberry growers, not in isolated 

 cases, but in hundreds of cases. Great 

 results have been achieved by growers 

 in Canada. As I am more familiar with 

 Ihoseof the United States,however,lshall 

 __ mention some of them in particular. Note, 



Ir instance, the experience of Mr. g! 

 . Hawley, of Ea Mesa, Cal., who, under 

 te of September 10, 1907, relates his 

 perience for the season. From two 

 res of plants had been taken up to the 

 te named for the season, $2,596, and 

 I he plants were still yielding at the rate 

 of $60 a week. 



GOOD CARE GIVES BIG MONEY 



Mr. Henr'y Clute, of Hunt, N.Y., en~ 



.;aged for the first time in strawberry 



growing in 1906, when he set out an acre 



of plants. He took excellent care of 



his acre, and in 1907 he received in 



ctual cash, $888.17 from this first acre 



1 plants that he had grown; and it is 



^timated that fullyanother hundred dol- 



irs' worth were grown on this acre which 



ire given away, or consumed upon the 



lace by Mr. Clute's familv and the 



People engaged in gathering' the fruit. 



1 his case indicates what a novice may 



do in strawberry culture. Mr. Clute's 



* xperience is not an unusual one. If a 



man has a little plain common sense, is 



willing to work and intelligently care for 



t he plants, he need have no fear but that 



'<• will succeed in strawberry growing 



Mr. John Rucker, of Boston, N.Y 

 gathered more than 9,000 quarts of 

 'lerries from a single acre in 1907, but 

 > he sold them in Buffalo on commission 

 If received a little less than ten cents a 

 'liiart, so that his total cash income from 

 I he acre was slightly under $900. Mr 



W. H. Burke, Three Rivers, Michigan 



H. B. Steward, of Myrtle Point, Ore., 

 took $1,500 in the season of 1907" from 

 an acre; Mr. James Calder, of Clayton, 

 N.Y., 1,000 plants, $310; Mr. Columbus 

 Knight, of^ Falmouth, Me., $1,000 an 

 acre; Mr. M. F. H. Smeltzer, of^Van 

 Buren, Ark., made $1,079 from an^cre 

 in 1907; Mrs. Mary Malpass, of Ingersoll, 

 Ont., sold $560 worth of strawberries 

 from an acre last season. 



herself with dignity and comparative 

 ease by successfully conducting a small 

 strawberry farm. Hundreds of other 

 women are engaged successfully in the 

 work. 



A BUSINESS FOR WOMEN 



Strawberry growing is distinctly a line 

 of work fitted for womankind. Some of 



Kind Words 



Orchardists in every part of 

 Canada should subscribe to The 

 Canadian Horticulturist. The 

 fruit raiser who can take this 

 practical and progressive monthly 

 magazine without making more 

 from the reading of its fruitful 

 pages than the cost of a year's 

 subscription (sixty cents) must be 

 a very dull scholar. The book is 

 full of timely, helpful, practical in- 

 formation, on fruit, flower and 

 vegetable culture. Its growth of 

 circulation is a criterion of its 

 merits and popularity. February, 

 1907's, circulation was 5,520 cop- 

 ies. February, 1908, it was 7,824, 

 or an increase of over 2,300 copies 

 in a single year— a record of which 

 any publisher should feel justifia- 

 bly proud. If you have an acre of 

 orchard, you want this excellent 

 publication. — Bowma?ivi//e Siates- 

 man. 



the most encouraging experiences it has 

 been my pleasure to know about, have 

 been those of women strawberry grow- 

 ers. They usually press the children 

 into service, and thus succeed in hand- 

 ling comparatively large areas at a 

 trifling outlay for manual assistance. 

 One woman whose letter I have had the 

 privilege of reading, wrote from Santa 

 Cruz, Cal., that in 1907 she took from 

 one-tenth of an acre of strawberries, 

 $210 in cash. At Woodside, Minn., is 

 a young woman of culture who supports 

 97 



Si^, A SAFE AND SURE CROP 



- It may be said, in behalf of this line of 

 horticulture, that it is one of the safest 

 and surest known. In the fall of 1906, 

 when the heavy early frosts destroj'ed 

 vineyards and peach orchards, and even 

 killed out many hardy apple trees, over 

 a large section of the north central 

 states, comparatively little damage was 

 suffered by the strawberry. So hardy 

 that it grows upon Alpine heights, push- 

 ing up its green leaves in the spring-" 

 time through the snows upon the lofty 

 summits of_the Swiss mountains, so ac- 

 customed to the tropic suns that it 

 yields from early spring until late fall in 

 Cuba and in other tropical lands — the 

 universality of the strawberry plant is 

 greater, perhaps, than any other known 

 fruit. It will thrive and produce large 

 crops of fine berries on any soil that will 

 grow com or potatoes. Set these plants 

 in the spring of one year and they will 

 yield an abundant harvest in the early 

 summer of the following year — a crop 

 that will bring a sum sufficient to put the 

 grower upon his feet financially where, 

 had he set out an orchard of any kind, 

 he would be able to count upon no in- 

 come worthy of mention under five 

 years, even though all the circumstances 

 were most favorable. 



To the man who seeks an'independent 

 living and whose means are limited, no 

 other line of enterprise offers so great 

 advantages as strawberry production. 

 One need not go to the Pacific Coast or 

 to the Gulf regions, or to any other par- 

 ticular place in order to get a start. 

 Whether a citizen of Canada or the 

 United States, he may rent an acre or 

 two near his own home, and begin at 

 once to do business. There never has 

 been on the markets of this country a 

 half-supply of high-quality fruit that 

 commands top prices. 



There is a limitless field open to the 

 man who will grow big red strawberries, 

 well-flavored and firm, no matter where 

 he may be located. Plant this spring. 



