October 22, 1890.] 



Garden and Forest. 



5ii 



Cape Cod Cranberries. 



CRANBERRY-GROWING is unique among our horticul- 

 tural industries. All a man's knowledge of gardening 

 and fruit-growing in general is useless when he undertakes to 

 grow this berry. He must lay aside his common notions of 

 soils and tillage, and even discard the very tools which from 

 boyhood he has considered essential to any kind of cultiva- 

 tion. 



The Cranberry-growing sections of the country are few and 

 scattered. The Cape Cod district is the pioneer ground of 

 Cranberry culture, and it still undoubtedly holds first rank in 

 general reputation. In provincial parlance the Cape Cod re- 

 gion includes all the peninsular portion of the state, beginning 

 with the lower and eastward projection of Plymouth County. 

 The Cranberry region extends from this eastern portion of 

 Plymouth County eastward to the elbow of the peninsula, or, 

 perhaps, even farther. 



Upon one of the upper arms of Buzzard's Bay is the old 

 town of Wareham. Here the tides flow over long marshes 

 bordering the inlet, and rise along the little river which flows 

 lazily in from the Plymouth woods. Here the sea-coast vege- 

 tation meets the thickets of Alder and Bayberry and Sweet 

 Fern, with its groups of Wild Roses and Viburnums. And 

 in sheltered ponds the Sweet Water Lily grows with Rushes 

 and Pond Weeds in the most delightful abandon. In the warm 

 and sandy glades two Dwarf Oaks grow in profusion, bearing 

 their multitude of acorns upon bushes scarcely as high as one's 

 head. The Dwarf Chestnut-Oak is often laden with its pretty 

 fruits when only two or three feet high, and it is one of the 

 prettiest shrubs in our eastern flora. 



Driving northward over the winding and sandy roads into the 

 town of Carver, where the largest Cranberry plantations are 

 located, our journey lies in the Plymouth woods. And here 

 the surprises begin ! We see no fields of Corn and Grass, and 

 snug New England gardens, and quaint old houses whose 

 genealogies run into centuries ; but we plunge into a wilder- 

 ness ! — not a second growth, half-civilized forest, but a primi- 

 tive waste of sand and Pitch Pine and Oaks ! The country has 

 never been cleared, and it is not yet settled ! And in its wilder 

 portions deers are still hunted and lesser game is frequent ! 

 And only fifty miles away is the bustling Hub of the universe ! 



This Cape Cod region is but a part of the sandy waste which 

 stretches southward and westward through Nantucket, along 

 the north shore of the sound and through a large part of Long 

 Island; and essentially the same formation is continued along 

 the New Jersey seaboard. Similarities of soil and topography 

 are always well illustrated by the plants they produce. The 

 Pine-barren flora of New Jersey reaches northward into the 

 Cape country, only losing some of its more southern types be- 

 cause of the shorter and severer seasons. But more diligent 

 herborizing will no doubt reveal closer relationship between 

 New Jersey and Cape Cod than we now know. An instance in 

 my own experience illustrates this. The Striped Sedge {Carex 

 striata, var. brevis) is recorded as a rare plant, growing in 

 Pine-barrens from New Jersey southward, and yet in these 

 Plymouth woods, in the half sandy marshes, I found it grow- 

 ing in profusion. Even eastern Massachusetts is in need of 

 botanical exploration ! So the floras run along this coast; and 

 it is not strange that Cape Cod and New Jersey are both great 

 Cranberry producing regions. 



The country comprises an alternation of low, sandy eleva- 

 tions, and small swamps in which the Cassandra, or Leather- 

 leaf, and other Heath-like plants thrive. The Pitch Pine makes 

 open and scattered forests, or in some parts Oaks and Birches 

 and other trees cover the better reaches. Fire has overrun 

 the country in many places, leaving wide and open stretches 

 carpeted with Bearberry (Arctostaphylos) and dwarf Blueber- 

 ries. Clear and handsome little lakes are found in some parts 

 of the wilderness, and everywhere one finds clear and wind- 

 ing brooks, abounding in trout. And over all the open glades 

 the great-flowered Aster {Aster spectabiiis) is brilliant in the 

 autumn sun. 



It is in the occasional swamps in this sandy region that the 

 Cranberry plantations or "bogs" are made. In their wild state 

 these bogs look unpromising enough, being choked with 

 bushes and brakes. I am filled with a constant wonder that the 

 sandy plains are not also utilized for the cultivation of Blue- 

 berries. These fruits now grow in abundance over large 

 areas, and they are gathered for market. It would only be 

 necessary to enclose the areas, protect them from lire and re- 

 move the miscellaneous vegetation, to have a civilized Blue- 

 berry farm. Certainly Cranberry and Blueberry farms would 

 make an interesting and profitable combination. The expense 

 of growing the Blueberries would be exceedingly slight, and 



the crop would be off before Cranberry picking begins. To 

 be sure, wild berries are yet common, but they would not in- 

 terfere with the sale of better and cleaner berries which would 

 come from improved plantations. Wild Cranberries are still 

 abundant over thousands of acres, and the production of cul- 

 tivated berries is rapidly increasing ; yet the price has ad- 

 vanced from fifty cents and one dollar per bushel, with an uncer- 

 tain market, fifty years ago, to fifteen and twenty cents a quart. 



The largest cultivated bog in existence lies about six miles 

 north of Wareham, and is under the management of A. D. 

 Makepeace, one of the oldest and most experienced Cranberry 

 growers in the country. This bog is 160 acres in extent. 

 Other bogs in the vicinity belong to the same management. 

 These bogs are all as clean as the tidiest garden. The long 

 and level stretches, like a carpet strewn with white and crim- 

 son beads, are a most pleasing and novel sight. Here in early 

 September a thousand pickers camp about the swamps, some 

 in temporary board cabins, but most of them in tents. The 

 manager furnishes the provisions, which the campers cook 

 for themselves, and he rents them the tents. One hundred 

 and twenty pickers constitute a company, which is placed in 

 charge of an overseer, and each company has a bookkeeper. 

 Each picker is assigned a strip about three feet wide across a 

 section of the bog, and he is obliged to pick it clean as he goes. 

 The pickers are paid by the measure, which is a broad six- 

 quart pail with ridges marking the quarts. Ten cents is paid 

 for a measure. There is wide variation in the quantity which 

 a picker will gather in a day, ranging all the way from ten 

 measures for a slow picker to forty, and even fifty, for a rapid 

 one ; and in extra good picking seventy-five measures have 

 been secured. 



Various devices have been contrived for facilitating Cran- 

 berry picking. The Cape Cod growers like the Lumbert 

 picker best. This is essentially a mouse-trap-like box with a 

 front lid rising by a spiral spring. The operator thrusts the 

 picker forward into the vines, closes the lid by bearing down 

 with his thumb, and then draws the implement backward so 

 as to pull off the berries. Perhaps a fourth of the pickers use 

 the implements. Children are not strong enough to handle 

 them continuously, and where the crop is thin they possess 

 little advantage. Raking off the berries is rarely practiced in 

 the Cape Cod region. It is a rough operation, and it tears the 

 vines badly. Late in fall, if picking has been delayed and frost 

 is expected or pickers are scarce, the rake is sometimes used. 

 An ordinary steel garden rake is employed. The berries are 

 raked off the vines, and the bog may then be flooded and the 

 berries are carried to the flume,«where they are secured. 



This picking time is a sort of long and happy picnic — all 

 the happier for being a busy one. The pickers look forward 

 to it from year to year, and are invigorated by the change and 

 the novelty. 



The berries must now be sorted or "screened." If there 

 are no unsound berries, the fruit can be fairly well cleaned by 

 running it through a fanning mill ; and some growers find it 

 an advantage to put all the berries through the mill before 

 they go to the hand screeners. A screen is a slatted tray about 

 six feet long and three and a half wide at one end and 

 tapering to about ten inches at the other, with a side or bonier 

 five or six inches high. The spaces in the bottom between 

 the slats are about a fourth of an inch wide. The screen is 

 set upon saw-horses, and three women stand upon a side and 

 handle over the berries, removing the poor ones and the 

 leaves and sticks, and working the good ones toward the small 

 and open end, where they fall into a receptacle. The berries 

 are barreled directly if they are not moist, but if wet they are 

 first spread upon sheets of canvas — old sails being favorites — 

 and allowed to remain until thoroughly dry. 



The cultivated Cranberry is a native of our northern 

 states. It was first cultivated about 1810, but its culture had 

 not become general until forty or fifty years later. The berries 

 naturally vary in size and shape and color, and three general 

 types, named in reference to their forms, were early distin- 

 guished — the Bell, the Bugle and Cherry. So late as 1856 there 

 was no record of any particular named varieties aside from 

 these general types. But there are many named sorts in cul- 

 tivation now. Mr. Makepeace showed me seven varieties in 

 his largest bog. 



The common favorite is the Early Black, valuable because 

 it comes in three weeks ahead of the medium sorts. Picking 

 begins upon this variety about the 1st of September here. 

 When fully ripe, the berries are purple-black, and for this 

 reason they are favorites with consumers, for it is a common 

 though erroneous notion that pale berries are unripe. In late 

 fall the foliage of the Early Black assumes a purplish tinge, 

 which quite readily distinguishes it from any other variety. 



