283 



LVL ON THE CULTIVATION OF STRAWBERRIES. 

 [Read before the HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY, December 2lst, 1824.] 



MR. KEENS has published, in the Transactions of the Horticultural 

 Society*, some excellent observations upon the proper modes of managing 

 different varieties of the strawberry ; in conjunction, however, with some 

 opinions which I do not think well founded : and as I rarely see in the 

 gardens of my friends that which is, in my opinion, even a moderately 

 good crop of strawberries, I shall proceed to state some conclusions 

 which theory and practice have conjointly led me to draw, relatively 

 to the most advantageous modes of culture of those species and varieties 

 of fruit. 



I perfectly coincide in opinion with Mr. Keens, that the spring is the 

 only proper season for planting. At that season of the year, the ground, 

 having been properly worked and manured, will long continue light and 

 permeable to the roots, which will consequently descend during the 

 summer deeply into the soil. Abundant foliage will be produced, which 

 will be fully exposed, through the summer, to the light ; and much true 

 sap will be generated, whilst very little, comparatively, will be expended ; 

 for if any fruit stalks appear, those should be taken off. In the following 

 season, as Mr. Keens has justly observed, a superior crop will be borne 

 than by plants of greater age, or differently cultivated. 



When plantations of strawberries are made, as they usually are, in 

 the month of August, the plants acquire sufficient strength before winter 

 to afford a moderate crop of fruit in the following year : but the plants 

 will not have formed a sufficient reservoir of true sap to feed even such a 

 crop, without being too much impoverished ; their spring foliage will be 

 also exhausted in feeding the fruit, and will continue, through the 

 summer, to shade the leaves subsequently produced. The aggregate 

 produce in two seasons will, in consequence, generally be found to be less 

 in quantity, and very inferior in quality, to that afforded in one season 

 by a plantation of equal extent, made in the spring. 



Mr. Keens suffers his beds to continue three years, though he admits 

 that the produce of the first year is the most abundant, and of the best 

 quality ; and in order to afford his plants sufficient space, when they are 

 three years old, he places them at too great distances, in my opinion, 

 from each other, to obtain the greatest produce from the smallest extent 

 of ground. He places his hautbois and pine strawberry plants at eighteen 



* Vol. II. page 392. 



