268 Success with Small Fruits. 



toes, and heavily manured in the spring of 1877. These potatoes were dug and 

 marketed during the last week in July and first week in August of the same year. 

 The ground was at once cleared off, plowed and harrowed smoothly. Furrows 

 were then opened four or five inches deep and two and a half feet apart. Between 

 the 1 5th and 22d of August, 1877, the strawberry plants were set in these furrows 

 from fifteen to eighteen inches apart, without any manure being added. Some 

 plants died here and there, but the bulk of those set out made a strong growth 

 before cold weather. They were kept free from weeds by running a cultivator 

 twice between the rows and hoeing twice. This treatment kept the ground abso- 

 lutely free from weeds. In the middle of December, the plants were covered over 

 with a compost of the sweepings of the vegetable and fish markets, with some horse 

 manure mixed through it. The whole was thoroughly decayed and light in charac- 

 ter. About the middle of April, 1878, the coarsest part of this mulch was raked off 

 the strawberry plants, and left in the spaces between the rows, the finer portion 

 being left among the plants. To the coarse part raked off was added salt hay, 

 pressed under the leaves of the plants on either side of the rows, enough 

 being added to keep the soil around the plants moist and the fruit free from 

 grit. There was no disturbance of the soil in any way in the spring, beyond 

 the cutting off at the surface of a few straggling weeds that started up here 

 and there. 



" The varieties grown upon this acre were ' Charles Downing ' and * Green Pro- 

 lific,' and the yield was five thousand four hundred and eighty-seven (5,487) 

 quarts. The gross receipts from this acre of berries was seven hundred and ninety^ 

 five dollars and sixty-one cents ($795.61). Deducting the commissions and picking' 

 the fruit, the net returns were $620.60." 



Messrs. Gibson and Bennett, of New Jersey, stated before the Western 

 New York Horticultural Society, that they " liked the bedding system, 

 say four-row beds, with plants one foot apart each way, and two-feet walks 

 between the beds. We fertilize with fine horse manure, spreading it 

 heavily and plowing it under. We start plants in pots, and transfer them 

 to the beds in September, the earlier the better. These potted plants 

 form fine, large crowns, ready for the finest fruit. The beds are 

 covered with manure January 1st The fruit is picked the following 

 June, and the beds then plowed under at once, and planted with other 

 crops." 



By this system, it will be seen that the plants occupy the ground but 

 about ten months, and little or no cultivation is given. It is practically 

 the same method as that employed around Charleston, S. C, and, I am 

 inclined to think, could often be practiced at the North with great profit. 

 In contrast, Mr. J. K. Sharpless said, on the same occasion : " We grow 

 in the hill system, and expect the plants to last four or five years"; adding, 

 " My experience teaches me that strawberries should not be cultivated 



