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AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST.- 
but feel that the great daily waste of organic 
matter going on in our Atlantic cities, to the 
injury of the public health, is one of those 
violations of Nature’s laws which the wants 
of the neighboring hungry soil has begun to 
suggest the means of averting. S. W. 
Waterloo, August 4, 1856. 
MOKE ABOUT STRAWBERRY GKO WING. 
A boy’s direction to boys and girls. 
[We have among our subscribers a boy 13 
years old who is quite an amateur as well as 
a practical grower of good strawberries. 
We invited him to write out some plain di¬ 
rections for Boys and Girls who have had 
little or no experience,.and we give below 
what he has furnished, with the remark, that 
most of what is said will be found highly 
useful to grown up boys and girls.]— Ed. 
To the Editor of the American Agriculturist: 
In answer to your request 1 will do as 
well as I can, but I shall have to get some 
help of my father, who is very fond of rais¬ 
ing fine strawberries, and who has taught 
me to do the same. 
All the boys are fond of hunting wild 
strawberries, and how many of them will 
travel miles and miles, and spend nearly a 
whole day to get a basket full of the small, 
wild kinds, when no more time and labor 
would be required to raise a bushel of fine 
large berries. I am sure all the boys, and 
girls too, would raise them at home if they 
knew how easy a matter it is, and if they 
knew how to do it. I will try and tell them 
all I can about it. 
Next month, that is, September, is a very 
good time to set out plants, which will bear 
quite a quantity of berries next Summer, and 
many more the Summer after. The first 
thing is to prepare the ground, and much 1 
find depends upon this—but it is a very sim¬ 
ple thing after all. Put on plenty of good 
stable manure, if well rotted so much the 
better. Either horse or co.v droppings, or 
in fact any kind of manure will do. Put it 
on two or three inches deep, and dig it in. 
Spade the ground deeply, at least fifteen 
inches, if two feet so much the better. A 
patch of ground upon which early potatoes 
grew will be nice—or any other mellow 
ground. 
Now make your bed three leet wide, and 
put, if you can get it, a board on each side 
to stand and walk on—but no matter about 
this, it only makes the job so much nicer 
and keeps the fruit that falls over in the path 
clean, and also is likely to prevent it from 
being trod on in picking. 
Your bed being now all ready and settled, 
the next thing is to select and set the plants. 
Much of the success will depend upon this. 
And first as to the plants. There are many 
valuable varieties now in cultivation, and 
also many worthless ones. Hovey’s seed¬ 
ling is a good kind, so is MacAvoy’s supe¬ 
rior and Longworth’s prolific. I like the last 
the best. It is a perfect blossom, and does 
not require any other kind with it. But if 
you cannot get this, take one of the others, 
and then you must put with them a few of 
some other kind, such as the Early Scarlet 
or Iowa—one to every ten will do. 
If you can get the plants near home, go 
for them yourself, and take them up care¬ 
fully. Select vigorous young- plants, put 
them into a basket and cover the roots im¬ 
mediately with earth to keep the small fibers 
from getting dry. This is very important to 
your success. Plant them in the evening 
with a garden trowel, or some other imple¬ 
ment that will open the earth well. Set 
them in rows across the bed, making the 
rows eighteen inches apart, and putting the 
plants in the* row about one foot apart. 
Press the earth firmly about the roots and 
then water each plant well. Now cut some 
grass and scatter over the plants ; this will 
shade them from the sun and keep the 
ground moist. If these directions are care¬ 
fully followed the plants will not know that 
they have been removed, but will grow' on 
almost immediately. 
You may plant any time from this till the 
first of November, but the sooner the better. 
After the plants have begun to grow well 
—say in about ten days—you may take off 
the hay and keep the ground raked well, and 
let no weeds grow. If any runners should 
appear pinch them off. This will make the 
plants strong. If you will occasionally ap¬ 
ply some liquid manure from the barn yard 
it will help the plants. 
Nothing more need be done till the first of 
December; then throw over each plant a 
small shovel full of fine, well-rotted manure 
or rotten leaves, which will protect them in 
the Winter from being frozen out, and will 
also enrich the ground. 
Nothing will be required in the Spring but 
to keep the ground clean of weeds. When 
the plants come into bloom cut some grass 
and cover all the ground between the plants. 
This will keep the fruit clean and the soil 
moist. If any runners appear before the 
fruit is ripe, pinch them off. They .will ex¬ 
haust the plants and take from the fruit. 
When the berries begin to ripen, if the sea¬ 
son is dry, take, in the evening, some water 
from the well and water the plants with a 
watering pot. Father thinks rain water 
spoils the flavor of the fruit, but that well 
water does not. 
After the plants have done bearing, keep 
beds clear from weeds and cut off the run¬ 
ners once a week. This will take but a few 
minutes. The plants will then become fine 
large ones, capable of bearing the next sea¬ 
son a pint of fruit each—and this is also the 
only way to keep your bed from being full 
of weeds. If you want more plants to ex¬ 
tend your bed, which you will, I am sure, 
let some runners take root and remove the 
plants as soon as they are large enough. 
On the approach of Winter, again spread 
over the bed about one or two inches of good 
fine manure to protect the plants and also to 
enrich them. Managed in this way a bed 
will last, four or five years, and delight you 
with its fine, large, red, ripe sweet strawber¬ 
ries. I hope my young friends will try these 
directions, and see if I am not right. I think 
a great deal of my strawberry beds, and 1 
should like to have all others enjoy such 
berries. I hope, Mr. Editor, that you will 
keep on writing such articles as the one in 
the August Agriculturist about the “ Five 
Thousand Strawberry Beds.” 
Your young friend, 
George. 
FLOWERING BULBS. 
This month the time to plant—Description 
of the most common — Snoui-Drops — Crown- 
Imperials — Lilies, Candidurn or While , Ti¬ 
ger, d/-c. — Crocus —Tulips — Hyacinths — 
Practical directions for culture of these and 
other bulbs, cjc. 
Bulbous plants are those which yield a 
scaly bud either below or above the ground. 
These buds or bulbs are formed of over¬ 
lapping scales which in some cases are ar¬ 
ranged like the leaves of a flower, and in 
others, as in the onion for example, the 
scales or layers pass entirely around the 
bulb, save a small opening at the top. The 
scales are all connected at the base of the 
hulb, from which point roots are given out 
to produce new plants. Some of this class 
of plants produce the bulbs under the ground, 
which are called root-bulbs-—the tulip, cro¬ 
cus and onion for example—while others 
furnish the bulb upon the stalk, or axils of 
the leaves above ground,such as the tiger 
lily, top onions, &c. The latter class 
of bulbs are nourished by the parent plant 
until they attain maturity, when they fall .to 
the ground, and send forth roots to produce 
new plants. 
Solid bulbs like the potato and dahlia, 
which are devoid of the laminated scales or 
layers, are called tubers. 
Several varieties of bulbous plants pro¬ 
duce rich, showy, fragrant flowers, many of 
which come into bloom very early in the 
spring—some of them while the snow banks 
still linger by the hill-sides and hedges. 
This circumstance, together with the ease 
of cultivation, renders them worthy of a 
place in every garden or flower-plot, how¬ 
ever small or humble. 
This being the season for setting many ol 
the bulbs lifted from the soil during June 
and July, we give below a descriptive list of 
some of the most desirable, with directions 
for planting and cultivating. We shall only 
speak of those hardy varieties which require 
planting in the autumn, purposing to extend 
oui list in the spring to those adapted to that 
season. 
Some varieties of bulbs do not keep well 
out of ground, and for the most part, these 
do not require lifting often. After they have 
been taken up in the spring or summer, it is 
well to leave them out for a few days lightly 
covered with dry earth, when they may be 
cleaned and packed away in drawers, or, 
what is better, put in boxes of dry sand. 
Bulbs may be grown on nearly all soils, 
excepting those very wet, but they flourish 
best on a rather light sandy loam, if it is ca¬ 
pable of retaining moisture. The amateur, 
who desires flowers of the richest colors, 
and faultless in shape and size, may make, a 
soil for his choice bulbs by excavating the 
earth to the depth of say two feet, of the 
size of the desired bed, and stir up the soil 
even below this ; after which, he may fill it 
with a mixture of say one-eighth of old rot- 
