24 STRAWBERRIES 
paid to a few important details, always provided that the 
grower has the necessary appliances and selects suitable 
varieties. 
In the first place it is essential that strawberries for 
forcing, to secure the best results, should be layered 
early and from uncropped plants (see Propagation), and 
the earlier in the season the whole batch—whether it be 
200 or 50,000 plants—can be layered and potted up, the 
better. By far the best plan is to layer into small pots 
and shift on into the 32-size as soon as the roots show at 
the drainage hole. I shall not go so far as to say that this 
method is essential, but it certainly is the most profitable, 
because the crop is more certain and the fruits finer 
than in the case of late layered plants from fruiting 
plantations. 
The market-grower who forces strawberries largely 
does not, as a rule, find it profitable to produce ripe fruit 
until almost the end of April, but then he follows a 
different method and one which has the merit of 
economising labour. This method is to layer the earliest 
runners on an ordinary plantation direct into the pots in 
which they will be fruited, using 5-inch pots for the 
earliest and 6-inch pots for the later batches. Some 
go a step further in their desire to save labour, and 
having filled a sufficient number of pots and stood them 
in blocks where they can be readily watered and shaded, 
bring the runners from the field, cut them up, and peg 
one plantlet in each pot. It is no wonder that the 
cry is frequent ‘‘it does not pay to force strawberries,” 
when such an unnatural and unreasonable mode of pro- 
cedure is followed. 
Let us presume then that early layers have been 
secured as advised, and that the time has arrived for — 
potting into the fruiting pots. The best compost con- 
sists of fairly heavy loam that has been stacked a few 
months, roughly pulled to pieces and mixed with not 
