496 BnSH-FBUITS 



ing them from a cold, wet swamp. My soil is dry and gravelly- 

 good corn land. The plants were of both the high-bush and the 

 low kind. They have borne abundantly, and we now have huckle- 

 berries by the bushel a good part of the season. The bushes grow 

 taller and better than those in the swamp, and the berries are a 

 great deal larger on both the high and low bushes." Attempts to 

 grow it at the Station have proved less satisfactory. Under date 

 of August 18, 1896, Professor S. A. Beach writes: "The heavy clay 

 soil upon which our small fruits are grown at this Station does not 

 appear to be at all favorably to the huckleberry, None of the 

 plants which are mentioned in the reports of 1882-3-5 are now 

 alive. We have made several attempts to grow this fruit from 

 seed and from rooted plants, but so far the results have not been 

 encouraging." 



The best success in growing the low blueberries, like Faccinium 

 Pennsylvanicum, has apparently been, not with ordinary garden 

 culture, but by transferring clumps of the plants to open pastures 

 or a similar location, mulching, and aiming to provide them with 

 nearly natural conditions. This is said to have been done to a 

 limited extent in New England. As found wild, the low blue- 

 berries are much benefited by occasionally burning over the 

 ground. The most rational system of management may therefore 

 be a systematic burning of these wild tracts, as often as needed, 

 with some care in aiding the plants to take full possession of 

 the ground. 



There seems to be no reason why systematic treatment of 

 natural huckleberry land should not yield as good returns as any 

 other horticultural operation. An interesting instance of this kind 

 is reported from Michigan.'* A farm of eighty acres, having ten 

 or fifteen acres of huckleberry swamp on it, changed hands at a 

 lower price than otherwise, by reason of this "waste" tract. After 

 a vigorous campaign against berry -pickers, to establish his rights 

 of proprietorship, the owner, in 1880, sold fruit to the amount of 

 $700, and nearly as much in 1881. In other words, this ten or 

 fifteen acres of land, which was supposed to be a detriment to the 

 place, had yielded more money than all the rest of the farm. Such 



*Mich. State Hort. Soc. Kept. 1881: 231. 



