R. /M. KELLOOO'S GREAT CROPS OP 
4 ^ ^ 
VII. That after a field lias iirortuced 
a heavy crop of berries its fruiting vigor 
is so impaired that plants should never be 
taken from it to start a new bed. 
The propagating' hed requires only a 
small plat of moderately rich ground; the 
size of plat depending on the number of 
plants required for setting the following 
spring. Manuring, plowing, etc., should be 
done as explained in succeeding chapters. 
To start with procure pure pedigree plants 
to set the required number you wish. As 
soon as runners start, layer thera by putting 
on a little stone, or bury shallow by putting 
a little moist earth on thera so that they will 
quickly root and relieve the mother plant, 
causing it to send out other runners and 
occupy all the ground. Grow all your plants 
in this way. Never take plants indiscrimi- 
nately from the edges of rows. They are 
tips and poor in vitality. 
START WITH PEDIGREE 
PLANTS. 
To select plants and build up a fruiting 
vigor as explained in preceding pages is 
the work of an expert. No amateur can 
detect the changes with a skill that shall 
send the plant variations in the right direc- 
tion. He must have had years of experience 
for if he select a poor plant then all is lost. 
It is expensive and involves an immense 
amount of work and great care. 
Xot one man in a thonsand has had 
sufficient training and experience and pos- 
sesses facilities for securing accurate results 
in this direction. 
I>on't get discouraged, you do not have 
to have this experience. What I have labored 
years to accomplish and expended large 
sums of money to demonstrate now comes to 
you free so that you can stock your farm 
with these high fruiters as cheaply as any 
reliable nursery can furnish their stock. 
Procure Pedigree plants in the spring and 
remove blossoms before they open as ex- 
plained previously. If you set a field the 
next spring take plants from beds you set 
this spring. If you decide to let your plan- 
tation fruit two or more years then set a small 
propagating bed of each variety to carry 
plants over from year to year. If you grow 
in hills or half matted rows this will be nec- 
essary in order to have future supplies of 
plants. In this way you can maintain their 
good quantity for many years. 
The.se plants have been selected so 
long the variations are now slight and if de- 
generation is prevented uniform results may 
be expected. Under no circumstances take 
plants from a bed which has once borne a 
crop of fruit. You will lose half your labor 
as sure as you do it. Don't spend your time 
trying to make exhausted plants bear a 
heavy crop. It positively cannot be done 
any more than you can force a scrub cow to 
make three pounds of bulter per day. It 
takes a thoroughbred to do that. 
SPURIOUS PLANTS. 
When a bed fruits, many small and inferior 
berries rot on the ground and the seeds grow, 
often resembling the parents but almost in- 
variably inferior to them; they make runners 
freely and crowd out the genuine plants. 
Nurserymen generally keep stock beds, 
allowing plants to stand from year to year 
to make runners and flood the country with 
these spurious, unproductive plants which 
make foliage instead of fruit. 
There are now scarcely any old standard 
sorts not mixed in this way. 
SELLING PLANTS. 
Whether or not it will pay you to invest a 
large sum of money in printing and send- 
ing out large expensive catalogs and other 
advertising, is a matter for you to determine 
in the future. But when you appear on the 
market with fine large fruit that leads the 
trade, and visitors flock to your farm and see 
all your plants loaded with magnificent 
berries and they learn that you can furnish 
pure pedigree stock from your propagating 
beds, the demand for plants from your 
neighbors will be large and gradually in- 
crease until it will of itself grow into a 
profitable business. 
It has been so in my own case and will be 
so with you, if you send out the highest 
grade of stock. 
Although I have more than doubled the 
size of my propagating beds every year and 
increased my help from one lone hired man 
to more than one hundred hands, I have 
never been able to supply the demand, and 
old customers are giving notice of largely 
increased orders for the coming spring. 
You will need to test all the new vari- 
eties and determine their value for yourself 
before you will dare to commend them to 
your friends and patrons. 
TESTING NEW VARIETIES. 
Originators of new varieties too often ruin 
their plants by letting them fruit to utter 
exhaustion to make a reputation and gain 
notoriety, and then take runners from them 
and send to other growers who in turn let 
them fruit heavily and propagate from them, 
and thus they become worthless. 
To test such plants for the purpose of 
ascertaining their adaptability to your soil 
and location is misleading. In experiment- 
ing with new varieties we always order 
double the amount desired for fruiting, tak- 
ing one-half for testing and use the bal 
ance to breed up by restriction and selection 
and if found a desirable variety we propa- 
gate only from the latter to send out to pur- 
chasers. 
In many instances the first plants show no 
valuable characteristics but later when im- 
proved by breeding up are very valuable, 
it always requires several years to deter- 
mine the value of any new variety. The 
greatest care should be used to send to reli- 
able propagators to get original and im- 
proved stock and then see that it is kept 
up to the highest standard of fruiting vigor. 
