Culture of the Cranberry. 175 
tivation of this fruit, is by the late Sir Joseph Banks, who in 1843, 
produced from a bed 18 feet square, 3| Winchester bushels; being 
at the rate of 400 bushels to the acre. Capt. Henry Hall, of Barn- 
stable, Mass., has cultivated this fruit for the last twenty years. 
His method is to spread on his swampy ground a quantity of sand; 
this is to kill the grass; but where sand is not at hand, gravel will 
answer the same purpose. He then digs holes four feet apart each 
way, and puts in the holes sods of cranberry plants about one 
foot square. 
As this plant naturally grows in a wet soil, it is generally sup- 
posed it will not thrive in a dry soil; but this idea is erroneous. 
Mr. Sullivan Bates, of Bellingham, Massachusetts, has cultivated 
the cranberry on a dry soil for several years with the utmost suc- 
cess; having produced 300 bushels to the acre on several acres, 
and his fruit double the usual size. His method is to plow the 
land, spread on a quantity of swamp muck, and after harrowing 
the soil thoroughly, set out the plants in drills twenty inches apart, 
hoeing them the first season. After this no cultivation is needed. 
By both of the above methods the plant w^ill cover the ground in 
three years. 
From my own knowledge of the cranberry for the last thirty 
years, should I design commencing the cultivation of this fruit on 
an extensive scale, I would try it on both swampy and dry soils. 
I would drain the swampy soil, plow it as early as possible in 
the spring, and set out the plants on the plan of Mr. Bates. 
To show the rapidity with which cranberry plants increase, I 
will add this statement from an English work on fruits: An Eng- 
lish gentleman had only a few plants, these he cut in small pieces 
or cuttings, and set them out in a green house. In the spring he 
prepared some swampy ground by spading it 12 inches deep. In 
a bed 150 feet long, and 4 wide, he set out 75 feet cuttings in 
one drill through the length of the bed, putting the cuttings two 
feet apart in the drill, and yet in three years the plants completely 
covered the ground. 
In Massachusetts the cranberry crop is once in a few years cut 
off by the late spring frosts. This may be prevented where a 
meadow is so situated as to be flowed. The water should not be 
over one or two inches deep on the cranberries, nor be left on 
later than the last of May in this climate. If kept on till it be- 
comes warm, it will kill the vines. Perhaps the best manage- 
ment would be something as they flood rice fields at the south, or 
water meadows in England, — let the water on while the weather 
is coldest, and then take it off" as it moderates. Sometimes, in 
the eastern states, the cranberries are destroyed by a frost in Sep- 
tember; where water is convenient and plenty, the meadow could 
be flowed on cold nights at this season, as well as in the spring. 
