THE STRAWBERRY SEPTEMBER 1906 



prepared for it. The roots have often 

 filled the box completely. I used this 

 method last year and every plant grew. 

 Not one plant winter killed. 



I count the strawberry bed a success, 

 even if we did lose many berries by hav- 

 ing the hills too far apart. 1 succeeded 

 in doing what I had undertaken to do — 

 kept the plants restricted to the original 

 hills. 1 took great delight in seeing the 

 plants stool up — just as a woman delights 

 in her geranium bed. 



I'his is our experimental patch. We 

 may go into the business on a larger scale 

 some day, but I hope we shall never be 

 tempted to put out so large a field that 

 we cannot take care of it properly. 



Odell, ni., Aug. 1, 1906. 



The Picker's Chariot 



WE present herewith a unique in- 

 vention made by George Web- 

 ster of Christiana, Pa., and 

 which he has named a chariot. Certainly 

 there is something royal in the notion 

 that a strawberry picker may ride through 

 the fields and gather the crop sitting in 

 luxurious ease and shaded by the canopy 

 of his chariot from the sweltering rays of 

 the sun. Mr. Webster writes that his 

 only objection to strawberry growing was 

 the picking part — he couldn't get along 

 well with so much stooping over. As a 

 German employe on The Strawberry 

 farms remarked: "Ich overstoops so 

 much dot I cand't oopbend." This ap- 

 peared to be Mr. Webster's trouble, and 

 as necessity is the mother of invention, 

 this chariot is the outcome of this difficulty. 

 The engraving shows the chariot to be 

 a bottomless four-wheeled cart, with seat 

 for picker and a shelf for boxes. The 

 picker loads up the shelf with boxes, 

 takes his seat and by turning the wheels 

 with his hands moves down over the 

 rows, gathering the big ripe berries with 

 both hands — for he doesn't have to carry 

 a box in one hand. It will be observed 

 that the sun is shining down on that can- 

 opy good and strong, yet Mr. Webster 

 appears to be enjoying his hatlessness not- 

 withstanding the lack of protection at the 



WEBSTER'S CHARIOT FOR PICKERS 



MR. WEBSTER PICKING STRAWBERRIES FROM HIS CHARIOT UNDER A JULY SUN 



place where the hair ought to grow." 

 He writes us that he is compelled to ad- 

 mit his baldness, but doesn't want readers 

 to think the darkness of face indicates a 

 black friend and brother; it is so only be- 

 cause he sits in so deep a shadow. By 

 the way, Mr. Webster was celebrating 

 Independence Day in his chariot when 

 this photograph was taken, typifying, as 

 it were, his release from back-breaking 

 toil and the establishing of a new order of 

 things in the land of the strawberry. 



The chariot as shown carries thirty-two 

 boxes, weighs thirty-five pounds, may be 

 lifted and carried with ease from row to 

 row, and, as Mr. Webster points out, does 

 away with the moving of boxes, the 

 trampling of the vines and the crushing 

 and loss of many strawberries. The vines 

 come up through the frame of the chariot 

 and really are in the lap of the picker, 

 standing upright, so that the picker may 

 readily strip themoftheirfruit, placing it in 

 the boxes which, as fast as filled are placed 

 upon the shelves, out of the direct rays 

 of the sun. "I pick them in the shade, 

 carry or haul them in the shade and do 

 not get off the seat until the end of the 

 row is reached," writes Mr. Webster. 

 Comfort for the picker, safety to vines 

 and fruit, and economy in all ways, is the 

 strong claim made by Mr. Webster for 

 his chariot. 



TM^OW that denatured alcohol may be 

 ^ ^ manufactured by everybody without 

 having to pay an internal revenue tax 

 which up to this time has been prohibitive, 

 we hope to see our friends in the rural 

 districts take advantage of the opportunity 

 and use up all the wastes of berry patch, 

 orchard and farm in manufacturing a 

 commodity that ought to stand for a very 

 large economy. No individual may un- 

 dertake this work, depending upon the 

 w-aste of his own farm to supply the raw 

 180 



material. It will require quite an expen- 

 sive plant to distil the alcohol, and no 

 one person in the community will care to 

 undertaKe it. But at this point coopera- 

 tion may be employed and the alcohol 

 made at little cost that shall heat and 

 light the houses of the farmers, run his 

 engine, and in many ways serve as an 

 important feature in farm economy. De- 

 natured alcohol, as all know, is a non- 

 drinkable, poisonous alcohol, and useful 

 onlj' in the arts. By all means cooperats 

 and make the most of this great oppor- 

 tunity. 



Pointers for the Procrastinator 



THE easiest way of starting a planta- 

 tion of strawberries in the home 

 garden is to set young plants i:i 

 early spring, the earlier the better. Of 

 course, the ground must be rich and well 

 prepared. A new bed invariably does, 

 better than an old one, no matter how we 

 treat it, for the strain of bearing a heavy 

 crop of berries is a severe one and must 

 necessarily weaken the old plants, says a 

 writer in Farm and Fireside. For that 

 reason also I would prefer to take plants 

 for setting from a young bed that is just 

 ready for bearing its first crop. But when 

 one has been neglectful and failed to 

 make a new plantation for home use, as 

 I did this year, then we must do the next 

 best thing. 



This I find to be the plan of taking up 

 nice and thrifty plants in big chunks from 

 the old bed after the picking season is 

 just over, preferably in a wet season or 

 shortly after a heavy rain, and set these 

 chunks in trenches dug deep enough so 

 that the plants stand on the level, the 

 rows being of the customary (four feet) 

 width, and the chunks set five or six feet 

 apart in the rows. The chunks are car- 

 ried from the old to the new patch prefer- 

 ably on a stone or mud boat, or on the 



