eight] strawberries AND THEIR KIN 



nection with this mixture, at the rate of about one 

 hundred pounds per acre. Another Experiment 

 Station recommends precipitated phosphate five 

 hundred pounds; kainit, one thousand pounds; 

 nitrate of soda, two hundred pounds — the nitrate 

 of soda being applied in the spring, and the rest 

 in the fall. But if you have fairly good garden 

 soil, not heedlessly exhausted by previous crop- 

 ping, you make your own manures. I have said 

 in another chapter that I would in all cases com- 

 post manures. The compost which I apply to my 

 strawberry beds comes from the house drainage 

 and waste, after it has been thoroughly intermixed 

 with decomposed barn manure and coal ashes. I 

 cover my strawberries in the fall quite freely with 

 this compost, applying liquid manure in the spring. 

 If your bed is near the barn, be sure that you have 

 every ounce of liquid manure caught in a stone 

 reservoir, or at least a sunken barrel, so that you 

 may save it for your berry plots, including the 

 strawberry. 



The position of a strawberry bed must depend 

 also upon your ability to irrigate. Unfortunately, 

 there is not one of our crops so easily spoiled as this 

 delicious berry. We are very liable to dry spells 



[103] 



