144 NORTHERN FRUIT-GROWING 



certain that the very heavy yields can be maintained. 

 In Kent a ton per acre is a very fair crop ; and though 

 the raspberry is naturally a northern plant, some of its 

 luxuriance may be due to the fact that it is being 

 grown on new land for the first time. So far little or 

 no manure has been needed, though the soil is a thin 

 gritty red or black moorland, by no means rich nor 

 highly esteemed for general farming. It seems almost 

 inevitable that as time goes on the raspberry growers 

 will begin to experience some of the troubles that fruit 

 growers meet with elsewhere, diseases will set in, and 

 the big crops will only be obtainable at a greater ex- 

 penditure of labour and manure. To an outsider the 

 dangerous feature about the industry is its dependence 

 upon a single crop ; in the meantime, however, the 

 Perthshire raspberry growing is a remarkable example 

 both of intensive cultivation and of the collective farm- 

 ing of a number of small men which many people desire 

 to see widely spread throughout Great Britain. 



