Lessons From the Experiences of 1906 



By J. B. Graves 



HK YEAR 1906 has been 

 a notable one. A few of 

 my own experiences in 

 growing strawberries will 

 be the subject of this arti- 

 cle. My Hrst bitter ex- 

 perience was with frost. 

 Spring opened slowly — a little late, ^'et 

 when it did come it soon warmed to 

 the work of its mission and had all nature 

 in a hurry; on a dead run, so to speak. 

 My plants wintered well, and, being 

 thrifty, were soon loaded with bud and 

 bloom. The flowers were noticeable for 

 their great size and abundant pollen. I 

 think I never saw a greater profusion of 

 blossoms. Nature seemed to be doing 

 her very best. The prospect for a bump- 

 er crop was certainly grand. For many 

 days I walked beside the snowy rows 

 charmed by the beautiful sight, enthused 

 at the splendid promise of reward, and 

 like a frisky colt stepped high in my de- 

 light and whistled out my effervescent 

 joy. 



But heavens and earth! what's the mat- 

 ter now! All creation has had a spasm. 

 The temperature has fallen to 28 degrees 

 and my hopes to nine miles below zero. 

 On the morning of the 9th of May ice in 

 my water trough was one-fourth of an 

 inch thick, leaves and flowers on the 

 strawberry plants were frozen stifF, berries 

 as large as chestnuts were as hard as ice, 

 and the foliage of sassafras, hickory and 

 oak was killed as by hre. I suffered a 

 complete change of heart. My high step- 

 ping was changed to wabbling, and my 

 whistling for joy to groaning in despair. 

 I felt inexpressibly bad. 



The frost was quite extensive. It 

 reached to many states. It greatly re- 

 duced output of berries. It was partial 

 in its treatment of the growers. Some 

 growers' fields it ruined entirely, some it 

 destroyed partly, and some it hurt not at 

 all. All these differences were seen in 

 the same locality. 



Frost will come, and it is beyond our 

 control. However, we sometimes may 

 circumvent its ravages by a thoughtful 

 expedient. Three years ago we had a 

 harder freeze when strawberries were in 

 bloom than we had in 1906, and one of 

 our large growers saved twenty acres by 

 raking the mulching out of the middles 

 and piling it upon the rows. That Held 

 escaped damage almost entirely. 



But the frost of 1906 was not without 

 some compensation. It cut down the 

 yield of berries, but at the same time it 

 put up the price of the product and en- 

 abled the growers to get more clear mon- 

 ey for their crop than they would have 

 done if the frost had not come. If there 

 had been no frost the plants would have 

 borne a big crop of little berries. It 

 would have been difficult to get them all 

 picked. The market would have been 



glutted with small, unsalable fruit. Prices 

 of such offerings would have been low. 

 Receipts would have been small, and the 

 season's results would have been very un- 

 satisfactory. As it was, the frost thinned 

 our fruit, thickened the price, trimmed 

 down our labor and expense, and turned 

 us out a handsome profit. 1 felt better 

 at the end of the season when I found I 

 had made more than I did the previous 

 year when I handled a much heavier har- 

 vest under more trying circumstances. 

 Then I whistled some more. Hereafter 

 when frost comes I shall endeavor to take 

 it philosophically and sleep soundly. 



Another trying experience was rain. 

 The early part of the year was quite 

 seasonable. I he crops were put in with- 

 out much hindrance and were cultivated 

 in good shape for a time. I set a new 

 field of strawberries in good time and 

 planted them in rows forty-two by thirty 

 inches. I cultivated them both ways and 

 had them clean as could be. I kept them 

 that way until cross cultivation ceased and 

 the runners were permitted to set. There 

 was no trouble until the row was pretty 

 well filled with plants. It was not until 

 the picking season was over that the trou- 

 blesome rains came. Then for many days 

 we had continuous rains and some were 

 very heavy. The ground was kept too 

 wet to work and the grass and weeds 

 grew amazingly. A part of my new bed 

 I succeeded in working out and a part I 

 didn't. The rains run me out. 



But while I could not get in my work 

 the crab grass did get in its work. By 

 the time the ground got dry enough to 

 work, the crab grass had become so thick 

 and strong that to hoe it out would do 

 more serious damage to the strawberries 

 than to leave it in, so I reluctantly left 

 it m, but kept the cultivators going 



between the rows. When I saw the 

 crab grass had about attained its growth 

 I put the mower in and clipped it just 

 above the strawberries and let it lie on 

 the row. In a few days it was cured and 

 dry and the strawberries made their way 

 up through the fine hay. At the present 

 writing those plants are not so thick nor 

 so vigorous as those in the clean field, 

 but they give promise of producing a 

 pretty good crop next year. A neighbor 

 grower of mine was caught last year as I 

 have been this and mowed his field as I 

 mowed mine, and this year in spite of the 

 frost he harvested an excellent crop from 

 that grass-covered field. 



A very remarkable case in this locality 

 was of a field so thickly covered with 

 crab grass last fall that scarcely a straw- 

 berry plant could be seen. Last spring 

 the grower feared the plants never would 

 find their way up through the grass. So 

 he raked it off the rows and tramped it 

 down between them. That field was 

 one of the best in this locality this year 

 and produced some of the earliest and 

 finest berries shipped from this point; and 

 Neosho is celebrated for its great straw- 

 berries. 



Now I do not believe in that method 

 of cultivation, nor do I recommend it, by 

 any manner of means; but it is a little 

 comforting to know that if the rain is 

 against you crab grass is for you and 

 seeks to aid you by mulching your field 

 free of charge! Frost and rain, both good 

 friends of ours, frequently have despoiled 

 our fields, given us many backaches and 

 heartaches and behaved themselves like 

 vicious enemies, seeking to do us an irrep- 

 arable injury. 



Then I had some experience with white 

 clover. This plant in a strawberry patch 

 is an unmitigated evil. In a cow pasture 



TAKING UP PLANTS FROM PROPAGATING BED FOR SETTING IN THE FRUITING BED 



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