THE STRAWBERRY NOVEMBER 1906 



self, tend the pickers in the forenoon and 

 sell the berries in the afternoon. 1 re- 

 member in 1886 of seilinjj thirteen of the 

 thirty-six quart crates of strawberries in 

 one afternoon, all in lots of a few quarts 

 to each house. 1 he people used to ex- 

 pect me at a certain hour, and 1 have a 

 pleasant picture in my mind of seeing the 

 ladies of Jefferson street stand out by the 

 sidewalk v\'ith their pans waiting for me 

 to come along one evening. I happened 

 to be a little late that day and they feared 

 they were going to miss their strawberries. 

 "My father never liked the strawberry 

 business and wisel)' opposed my plan just 

 enough to make me determined. I some- 

 times think that had he "fell in" with my 

 ways and tried to help it along, 1 never 

 would have been so enthusiastic in the 

 business as I have been. I feel that 1 

 needed a little opposition in order to fully 

 show what stuff was in me. I remember 

 a lesson he once gave me of learning to 

 depend on myself. I graduated from 

 Pulaski Academy in June, 1887. I did 

 not attend school that spring as 1 was 

 very busy with my strawberries. I had 

 three acres to fruit and quite a large new 

 set patch. There was a picnic for the 

 graduates the next day after commence- 

 ment exercises and I invited my girl' 

 to go to the picnic. It was picking day 

 that day and, on account of the extraor- 

 dinariness of the occasion, I supposed of 

 course that father would tend the pickers 

 for me, but when 1 approached him 

 about it early in the day, he very fiimly 

 told me that I must tend them myself. 

 It was a very bitter lesson for me, but I 

 staid with the pickers, although I felt like 

 kicking myself for disappointing the girl. 



A Noteworthy Strawberry Field 



ON page 197, October issue, is a pho- 

 to-engraving of the strawberr\' 

 patch of W. C. Landis, Shoals, Ind. 

 It would be impossible to conceive of a 

 more perfect piece of cultural work than 

 is displayed in that patch, and more beau- 

 tiful plants we have not seen. \Ve con- 

 gratulate him upon his work and the 

 results he has accomplished. 



Mr. Landis writes us that his patch is 

 70 X 90 feet in size, with rows thirty 

 inches apart and plants twenty inches 

 apart in the rows. '1 his patch was set 

 April 15, 1905, to 500 iMichels" Karly, 

 500 Parsons' Beauty, and 200 Bubach 

 plants, and they were grown in the 

 double-hedge row. He has cultivated 

 entirely with the rake and hoe. Mulched 

 hi? plants with new wheat straw January 

 20, 1906; uncovered them April 1. First 

 bloom was April 15 and first berries were 

 picked May 19; last berries picked June 

 14. Mr. Landis sold his first box of 

 berries for 25 cents, and sold sixteen 

 boxes of the last picking for 20 cents a 

 box. Of his total crop of 469 boxes 309 

 boxes were firsts and brought him 15 



cents a box; 160 were seconds and sold 

 for 10 cents a box. From which fact 

 one may judge of the high quality of 

 those seconds. How many would be 

 pleased to have their firsts equal them! 

 Mr. Landis' patch is not only a thing 

 of beauty; it points out the way to all of 

 us to win large success by doing every 

 part of the necessary work in the best 

 possible way, confident that the harvest 

 time will bring a sure reward in cash and 

 in that fine pleasure that the conscious- 

 ness of having done the best we could 

 must always bring. 



The Value of Ventilated Strawberry 

 Boxes 



DISCUSSION as to the relative 

 value of the ventilated strawberry 

 box has not been altogether favor- 

 able to the box made with that point in 

 view; that is, the ordinary box has been 

 found sufficiently ventilated to admit of 

 the necessary circulation of air to preserve 

 the fruit in good condition and flavor. 



Herewith is shown a box recently made 

 by a citizen of Rockford, 111. It is made 

 in one piece, and, as will be seen, is per- 

 forated and the base cut out for purposes 

 of ventilation. Anent the question of its 

 superior value because of these perfora- 

 tions and open base. The Strawberry ad- 

 dressed an inquiry to William A. Taylor, 

 pomologist in charge of field investigations 

 for the department of agriculture at 

 Washington. In reply Mr. Taylor says: 

 "From such experiments as we have 

 conducted we have found practically no 

 difference in behavior of strawberries in 

 storage in any of the commercial types of 

 package yet tested. All strawberry boxes 

 in commercial use known to us are 'ven- 

 tilated,' i. e., none are too tight for free 

 movement of air if the crates are given 

 proper space when piled. 



"We have tested some comparatively 

 tight special packages, however, and find 

 that while the tightness secured by wrap- 

 ping a crate with heavy paper or the in- 

 dividual boxes or baskets in it with 



paraffin paper is deMr:ihle because it pro- 

 tects fruit fr.-m disagreeable odors that 

 may arise from other products in the 

 storage room, it is quite possible to cause 

 injury to the flavor of the fruit by enclos- 

 ing it so closely as to prevent all move- 

 ment of gases. In such case the exhala- 

 tions from the fruit are retained and 

 smother it so that it dies quickly and 

 becomes tainted in flavor. 



^ '^ 



NATHAN'S teacher, according to the 

 Boston Herald, told the class to 

 make a rough illustration of the poem, 

 "The Old Oaken Bucket." 



Nathan's illustration consisted of a large 

 circle, three buckets and a bunch of dots. 



"Nathan," said the teacher, "I don't 

 understand this. What's the circle.'" 



"That't the well," replied Nathan. 



"And why have you three buckets.'" 



"One is 'the old oaken bucket' one is 

 'the iron-bound bucket,' and the o her is 

 'the moss-covered bucket which hung in 

 the well.' " 



"And what are those little dots.'" 



"Those are 'the loved spots which my 

 infancy knew.' 



How White Strawberries Were 

 Introduced 



VAGRANT tales concerning the 

 strawberry are frequently found in 

 the newspapers, and the enterpris- 

 ing authors are quite apt to be more inter- 

 esting than veracious. But here is one 

 that we risk clipping for the benefit of 

 our readers, warning them that we assume 

 no responsibility as to its authenticity. It 

 is an account of the accidental manner in 

 which the discovery recently vvas made 

 that the white strawberry of Jamaica will 

 thrive and yield abundantly in the rigorous 

 climate of New England. 



According to the narrator the white 

 berries reached Boston port as a private 

 speculation on the part of a steward on 

 one of the United Fruit Company's 

 steamers, who took aboard a crate of 

 them with the idea of working up a de- 



SPECIMEN OF A VENTILATED STRAWBERRY BOX 



Page 211 



