A SlNGLE-HEDUt HOW OF STHAWBbKKY PLANTS PROPERLY MATED, LOWER FOLIAGE REMOVED TO SHOW BERRIES 



Intensive Strawberry Culture— Congenial Mating of Varieties 



By Frank E. Beatty 



FOR several years I have been writ- 

 ing and talking about the neces- 

 sity of a complete combination in 

 strawberry growing; that is, the 

 necessity of a thorough knowledge of the 

 different features of the work. The dan- 

 ger with most of us is that we adopt a 

 hobby, and then ride that hobby to failure. 

 Some get a manure hobby, and pile on 

 the manure un'il their ground is so full of 

 nitrogenous fertilizer that the vegetative 

 parts of the plants are forced so vigorously 

 they cannot get time to form fruit buds 

 but go on building up surplus foliage and 

 runners at the expense of fruit. Then 

 there is the cultivating hobby, the mulch- 

 ing hobby, and a dozen other hobbies; 

 but no one hobby will ever do the busi- 

 ness. What we want is to be thorough 

 in every detail of the work from soil prep- 

 aration clear through the season up to and 

 including the marketing of the fruit. 



The feature of the work I will discuss 

 in this article is the proper mating of dif- 

 ferent varieties to insure perfect poUena- 

 tion. How well I remember my first 

 acre of strawberries, with their foliage al- 

 most hidden with beautiful bloom, that 

 afterward proved to be nothing more than 

 a flower bed, simply because I had failed 

 to comply with one of nature's laws — 

 the mating of varieties. Any variety will 

 bloom excessively whether it has a mate 

 or not, but what good is there in a lot of 

 infertile bloom.'' Nothing but disappoint- 

 ment, of course. It gives the grower 

 about the same kind of a riled-up feeling 

 that the poultryman has when it comes 

 hatching time and he learns that his in- 

 cubator is filled with infertile eggs. Like 

 the old hen, we have all passed through 

 that disappointment. 



Through a series of tests worked out 

 on my experimental plots at Covington, 

 Indiana, I discovered that even bisexuals 

 were greatly benefited by setting them 

 beside other bisexuals of the same season. 

 This is because the stigmas of the flowers 

 of many bisexuals are not receptive to the 

 pollen jiven off by the anthers of their 

 own flowers. In making this experiment 



I took a number of different bisexuals and 

 set them in alternate rows. In other plots 

 I grew the same varieties alone where 

 they had to depend upon the pollen from 

 their own flowers. All plots received the 

 same care and treatment. At fruiting time 

 the difference in yield and perfection of 

 fruit were quite noticeably in favor of ;he 

 plot containing the several bisexuals where 

 they were mated together. Here there 

 were very few barren blossoms, and the 

 berries seemed to be as near perfection as 

 it is possible to get them. In the plots 

 where the same bisexuals were set alone 

 there were a large number of barren flow- 

 ers, as well as many deformed and im- 

 perfect berries. 



For instance, the Jessie always has been 

 known as an excellent bisexual to set with 

 pistillates, and a pistillate will do well 

 when set beside it; but the Jessie will not 

 properly poUenize its own flowers. 



Why is it, we are often asked, that 

 strawberries will always yield more and 

 better fruit in trial plots and small gardens 

 than they do in large fields.? Simply be- 

 cause in trial plots and small gardens there 

 are always a number of difi^erent varieties, 

 and at blooming time there is an exchange 

 of pollen taking place. 



Several years ago I wrote an article on 

 mating bisexuals, but it still lies in my 

 desk. I never allowed it to be published 

 because I thought it best to carry out my 

 experiments more completely before mak- 

 ing them known to the public, and so the 

 experiments were continued from year to 

 year, always showing noteworthy gains in 

 favor of the mated plots. Professor S. W. 

 Fletcher of the Michigan Agricultural 

 College made some experiments last sea- 

 son along this same line with results in 

 favor of exchanged pollen. Fortunately, 

 the Professor made photographs of berries 



BLOSSOM OF THE MALE OR BISEXUAL BLOSSOM OF THE FEMALE OR PISTH^LATE 



With Ihis illustration before him it will be easy for even an amateur to determine the difference between the male and 

 female varieties. The male (bisexual) bloom is on the left. It is larger in every way than the female (pistillatci 

 which is on the right. Note the anthers on the male blossom surrounding the center cone. The white spots in the 

 center are the stigmas. When the anthers burst the pollen settles on the end of the stigmas. The germ of this pollen 

 finds its way down into the ovaries of the pistillate, and seed development at once begins, if the stigma is receptive. 

 If only a part of the stigmas are receptive the result will be a deformed berry; if none of the stigmas are receptive 

 a blank bloom is the result. On the other hand, if all the stigmas are receptive to the pollen at the time the 

 anthers burst, the berry will be fully developed and perfectly smooth. The female bloom (on the righti has no 

 anthers and must receive its pollen from some nearby male or bisexual. Hence the necessity of proper mating. 



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