JDIEECTIONS FOR BLUEBEEEY CULTUEE. 
7 
4. Keep the box at a temperature of 55° to 65° F., or as near those limits 
as practicable. A temperature of 70° or over is likely to ruin the cuttings. 
5. In order to avoid excessive temperatures, do not allow direct sunlight 
upon the glass, either keeping the box by north light or keeping it shaded, as 
by a white cloth or paper cover suspended several inches above the glass, or 
in a shaded greenhouse. 
6. Keep the air inside the box saturated with moisture. This condition will 
be evidenced by the condensation of the moisture on the under side of the glass 
during the cooler part of the day or whenever a cold wind blows against the 
glass. 
7. Watering should be as infrequent as practicable, only sufficient to keep 
the sand moist but well aerated and the atmosphere in the box saturated. If 
the glass fits tightly, a second watering may not be needed for several weeks. 
8. Within a few w^eeks new growth will begin to appear above the sand. 
(See PI. IV, fig. 1.) When the shoots have reached a length proportionate to 
their vigor, commonly 1 to 3 inches, their further growth is self-terminated by 
the death of the tip. After the leaves have reached their full size and acquired 
the dark-green color of maturity the time has come for the development of 
roots. 
9. When the first shoot has reached this rooting stage a half-inch layer of 
finely sifted rotted peat, 2 parts, and clean sand, 1 part, should be placed on 
the surface of the cutting bed and moistened well with water. A time-saving 
and perhaps desirable modification of this treatment is to use this mixture of 
peat and sand as the original covering of the cuttings, described in paragraph 3. 
10. The new growth, which if it had originated above the sand would be like 
an ordinary shoot, was transformed in working its way through the sand and 
became a scaly, erect rootstock, which on reaching the surface of the sand con- 
tinued its development into a leafy shoot. During the spring and early summer, 
roots form in abundance on the lower or rootstock portion of these shoots. 
(See PI. IV, fig. 2.) 
11. After a shoot is well rooted it commonly, though not invariably, makes 
secondary twig growth the same season, usually from a bud in the axil of the 
uppermost leaf. If the rooting of the shoot has not already been ascertained 
by direct examination, the making of such secondary growth is good evidence 
that rooting has actually taken place. 
12. When a shoot is well rooted, with roots 1 to 2 inches in length, it is ready 
to be potted. (See PI. V.) If the shoot has not already disconnected itself 
from the dead cutting, it should be carefully severed with a sharp knife. In 
the process of tubering, the behavior of the cuttings is essentially identical with 
that of real tubers, like those of the potato. The original cutting dies, but the 
sprouts that arose from it root at the base and form independent plants. 
13. The rooted shoots should be potted in clean 2-inch earthenware pots in 
the standard blueberry-soil mixture already described. (See PI. VI.) 
14. The pots should be bedded in moist sand up to the rim in a glass-covered 
frame or box, well 'lighted but protected from direct sunlight, and slightly 
ventilated but with a saturated or nearly saturated atmosphere. 
15. In order to secure rapid growth, the rooted plants should be gradually 
accustomed to a well-ventilated atmosphere and then to half sunlight, this 
adjustment extending over a period of about three to four weeks. 
16. If preferred, the rooted shoots may remain in the original cutting bed 
until the following spring, the cutting bed being exposed during the winter to 
freezing temperatures, but mulched with oak leaves, and the plants may then 
be transferred, with their whole root mat intact, to a peat and sand nursery bed 
at a spacing of about a foot each way. 
