576 



THE CRANBERRY. 



curing a late crop is to remove all the blossoms that would have produced 

 the first crop ; and then, after allowing the plants to receive a check from 

 the dry warm weather, which usually occurs in the latter end of June, to 

 supply water abundantly. The water in this and in all other cases should 

 have been sufficiently long exposed in a pond or basin to acquire the tempe- 

 rature of the atmosphere ; or this temperature, and a few degrees more, may 

 be given to it artificiall}^ by a portable heating apparatus. Strawberry plants 

 which have been early forced, when turned out into the open garden generally 

 produce some fruit late in the season (1093), and this quantity may be in- 

 creased in number and size by judicious watering. 



1251. Accelerating a crop in the open garden. — This may be done by 

 planting a row close along the base of a wall ha^dng a south aspect. The 

 best variety for tliis purpose is the Bishop's wick, which has small leaves 

 and an early habit, and which, so treated by j\Ir. ^Filliams of Pitmaston, 

 ripened its fruit towards the end of May. Another mode consists in planting 

 on the south side of an east and west ridge of soil. The ridge may be no 

 larger than to admit of a single row, or it may be four feet or five feet high, 

 so as to admit of tliree or four rows on the south side for accelerating a crop, 

 and an equal quantity on the north side for retarding one. If the ground 

 on the south side is covered with flat tiles, bricks, flints, or pebbles, they 

 will retain moisture, conduct heat to the soil, and reflect it also among the 

 plants. At East Combe, near Blackheath, a ridge of this kind, the sides of 

 which form an angle of 45°, ripens fruit three weeks earlier than the flat 

 surface of the same garden. The common calculation is a fortnight earlier 

 for the south side, and eight or ten days later for the north side ; so that 

 by means of a ridge, the strawberry season in the open garden is extended 

 at least three weeks. Sometimes these ridges are built of brick- work, in 

 steps^ and sometimes they are formed of stones, in the maimer of a wall 

 built without mortar, the plants being placed in the interstices. In which- 

 ever way the ridge is formed, there ought to be a gutter of three inches or 

 four inches in width along the apex, as a channel for supplying warm water 

 to the roots. It would be an improvement also to cover the south side of 

 the ridge during nights by mats or canvas, supported on hoops or rods at 

 nine inches or one foot above the plants, to check radiation. Ridges of this 

 kind require to be taken down every year after the crop is gathered, and 

 replanted with the earliest runners that can be got. The ordinary slope of 

 the ridge is an angle of 45°, because loose soil wdll remain stationar}' at that 

 angle ; but where the ridge is to be faced with stone or brick, the slope 

 may be nearly perpendicular, or at all events 70°. In the garden of a cottage 

 which has been built on a platfoi-m, the sloping bank which supports the 

 latter might be planted with strawberries, either with or without the addi- 

 tion of stones or tiles. 



1252. Gathering the fruit should take place when it is quite dry, and they 

 should be taken to table the same day. It should always be gathered with 

 the calyx attached, though tliis used to be generally neglected in Scotland 

 and on the Continent. 



1253. Forcing.— See 1090. 



SuBSECT. XIII. — The Cranberry/. 



1254. TJie Cranberry^ Oxycoccus, Pers, (Abelle, Fr. ; and Heidelbeere, 

 Ger.^Arb. Brit., p. 1028, and Encyc. of Trees and Shrubs, p. 616), is a 



