258 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



June 



CRANBERBT CTJLTTJRE— No. 2. 



Freparaiion of Soils for tlie Plants. — In this 

 operation, there is little unanimity of opinion, or 

 practice. If it is desired to reclaim a swamp, se- 

 lect one upon which water may be thrown at will, 

 and a good method is to flow it for an entire 

 year, as the brush at the end of that time will 

 usually be dead. Then draw off the water, cut 

 the bushes and hassocks, and in a dry time burn 

 the whole over. If thorough work is to be made 

 of it — and that is by far the most profitable pro- 

 cess — pull up the roots, take out stumps, fill 

 holes, and level, so as to make the surface easy to 

 work upon. While this has been going on, a 

 dam should be constructed of sufficient capacity 

 to flush water over the whole surface in a short 

 time, and then the field is ready for the plants. 

 These should be selected — 



1. From hearing vines, as some of them, like the 



grape and strawberry, are barren. 



2. From prolific plants — plants that you have 



seen with your own eyes, full of fruit from 

 year to year. 



3. From healthy vines — those that are young, of 



a dark green color in the autumn, before 

 they are entirely ripened or touched by frost, 

 and that show no signs of blight or mildew, 

 and have not been infested by worms. 



4. Select one of the three varieties mentioned, or, 



on a portion of the plantation, mix them with 

 each other. 



The vines being selected and brought to the 

 field in large quantities, one person should make 

 a suitable hole with a hoe, and another follow 

 with his barrow of plants, set them in the ground, 

 with or without roots, scrape the moist soil over 

 them and tread down with his foot. It matters 

 little whether one inch of the plant, or six is left 

 out of the ground, provided two or three, or more 

 inches are underneath. 



The closer they are set together, the sooner 

 will the ground be covered, the plants take pos- 

 session of the whole surface, and keep out all in- 

 truders, such as meadow grass, bushes and brakes. 

 If we were now to begin a plantation, we would 

 set them within one foot of each other, or if 

 plants were plenty, only six inches apart. 



In order to acquire all the information possible 

 respecting this fruit, we addressed several ques- 

 tions to persons interested in its culture in vari- 

 ous parts of this and some other States. On this 

 point of planting, a gentleman in New Hamp- 

 shire writes : 



"I set the plants three, or three and a half feet 

 apart, but if I were to set again, I would set three 

 times as thick — they will cover the ground so 

 much sooner, and stifle the grass and weeds bet- 

 ter. I made holes with a small stick in the soft 



soil and stuck in a wisp of vines about as large 

 as my finger ; sometimes they had roots, and 

 sometimes none. Out of 16,000 hills, I did not 

 see one that died. But my soil was very moist. 

 They grew finely, and I had a few berries the first 

 year. The third year I picked twenty-five bush- 

 els. The fourth year there were sixty bushels. I 

 sell them for three dollars a bushel at the house. 

 My vines will bear now from one to two hundred 

 bushels a year, according to the season. They 

 were set at the rate of 1000 hills a day for one 

 man." 



These 16,000 hills were made on four acres, 

 seven years ago, at the rate of 4000 hills per acre. 



Swamp lands, however, sometimes produce 

 good crops of cranberries without so much ex- 

 penditure of labor in clearing. When the bushes 

 are killed by flowing, or cut off", with the grass, 

 weeds and brakes, the vines are set at once, and, 

 if other things are favorable, a fine plantation is 

 produced. 



Another mode of obtaining a cranberry planta- 

 tion, or yard, as they call them on the Cape, is to 

 employ our common fresh meadows, that are an- 

 nually covered with grass and mowed. When 

 this is done, Mr. Hunt, whom we have already 

 quoted, says, "I would turn the turf bottom side 

 up, which may be done with hoes for about twen- 

 ty dollars per acre." 



In regard to employing grass land, a friend 

 who visited some of the best cultivators on the 

 Cape, on purpose to learn their modes of practice, 

 writes us as follows : 



"Another experiment I regarded as very suc- 

 cessful, viz.: planting among grass more than two 

 feet high. A man with a stout hoe turned up the 

 sod, put in a bunch of vines (not a sod of vines) 

 turned the sod back and stamped it down upon 

 them. This was all that was done in planting. 

 They were set four years ago, six feet apart, and 

 have now nearly exterminated the grass and cov- 

 ered the ground. We estimated the crop this 

 season to produce one and one-half bushels per 

 rod. The application of sand has had no bene- 

 ficial results." 



Another plat of small extent had the grass sub- 

 dued, and was sown over with vines cut as fine as 

 a hay-cutter would cut them. These had grown 

 but one season, but looked well, and satisfied me 

 that this mode of planting may succeed. They 

 will, however, require a much longer time to 

 come into bearing. Still another piece was com- 

 menced in 1850, on twenty rods, or one-eighth of 

 an acre, by taking off" the grass, and gravelling 

 over previous to planting. There were very few 

 berries the first two years, but the eight succeed- 

 ing years have netted him 5 150 annually, although 

 in one of these years he lost the entire crop by 

 frost. This is at the rate of one thousand and 



