Preparing and Enriching the Soil. 53 



greater part of many farms has already been practically accomplished. 

 Where the deep, moist loam, just described, exists, the fortunate owner 

 has only to turn it up to the sun and give it a year of ordinary cultivation, 

 taking from it, in the process, some profitable hoed crop, that will effect- 

 ually kill the grass, and his land is ready for strawberries. If his ground 

 is in condition to give a good crop of corn, it will also give a fair crop 

 of berries. If the garden is so far "subdued" as to yield kitchen 

 vegetables, the strawberry may be planted at once, with the prospect of 

 excellent returns, unless proper culture is neglected. 



Should the reader be content with mediocrity, there is scarcely any- 

 thing to be said where the conditions are so favorable. But suppose one is 

 not content with mediocrity. Then this highly favored soil is but the vant- 

 age-ground from which skill enters on a course of thorough preparation and 

 high culture. A man may plow, harrow and set with strawberries the 

 land that was planted the previous year in corn, and probably secure a 

 remunerative return, with little more trouble or cost than was expended on 

 the corn. Or, he may select half the area that was in corn, plow it deeply 

 in October, and if he detects traces of the white grub, cross-plow it again 

 just as the ground is beginning to freeze. Early in the spring he can cover 

 the surface with some fertilizer there is nothing better than a rotted com- 

 post of muck and barn-yard manure at the proportion of forty or fifty 

 tons to the acre. Plow and cross-plow again, and in each instance let the first 

 team be followed by a subsoil or lifting plow, which stirs and loosens the 

 substratum without bringing it to the surface. The half of the field pre- 

 pared in such a thorough manner will probably yield three times the 

 amount of fruit that could be gathered from the whole area under ordinary 

 treatment, and if the right varieties are grown, and a good market is within 

 reach, the money received will be in a higher ratio. 



The principle of generous and thorough preparation may be carried 

 still further in the garden, and its soil, already rich and mellow, may be 

 covered to the depth of several inches with well- rotted compost or any form 

 of barn-yard manure that is not too coarse and full of heat, and this may be 

 incorporated with the earth by trenching to the depth of two feet Of this 

 be certain : the strawberry roots will go as deeply as the soil is prepared 

 and enriched for them, and the results in abundant and enormous fruit will 

 be commensurate. English gardeners advise trenching even to the depth 

 of three feet, where the ground permits it. 



Few soils can be found so deep and rich by nature that they cannot be 

 improved by art ; and the question for each to decide is, how far the returns 

 will compensate for extra preparation. Very often land for strawberries 



