58 
JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 
January IS, 18fl, 
•earliest, and obtained the highest prices in the London, Man¬ 
chester, Liverpool, Edinburgh, Cardiff, and other markets.” In 
fthis he has undoubtedly been favoured by climate, as the district 
■supplies the earliest out-of-door fruit in the kingdom ; but the 
lesson of energy and perseverance is none the less valuable. This 
■success soon led to general Strawberry culture in the district, so 
•that now acres of Strawberries are grown where only small beds 
were once seen. 
The success with Strawberries led to the planting of bush 
fruits and orchards, but we gather that Strawberries still hold the 
leading position. To show something of the magnitude of the 
fruit business on this small farm, we may mention the gathering 
and sending off of 3000 punnets of Strawberries in a day. Com¬ 
petition has brought down prices, and the time has gone by when 
IMr. Lawry was able to realise £1000 for the fruit of a single 
season. But the gross receipts on the whole farm on an average 
•of'seasons still amount to £15 per acre, and be it remembered 
that the fruit land is less than a third of the entire area of the 
farm. The labour bill for this farm of OOj acres averages 
from £400 to £500 per annum, the difference being according to 
the abundance or not of the fruit crops, a good Cherry year entail¬ 
ing quite £20 a week extra during the picking season. The ordi¬ 
nary rate of wages is 15s. a week for nine months of the year, 
but in “ picking ” time it is raised to from 203. to 263. per week, 
•with no limit as to hours. Cherries are found to be an uncertain 
crop, 18 tons being sold in 1887, and only 15 cwt. in 1889. In 
■Strawberry and bush fruit time forty or fifty more extra hands; 
•chiefly women and children, are engaged. School children also 
■during the six weeks holiday earn from Gs. to lOs. apiece per 
week. 
Strawberries, Easpberries, and Gooseberries, with other bush 
fruit, were all good last year. Plums were fairly good ; Cherries 
■and Apples almost failures, except one variety of Apple, which is 
being cultivated extensively as a reliable bearer, but of which the 
name is not mentioned. This result accords with Mr. Wright’s 
caution in “Profitable Fruit Giowing,” to grow only reliable sorts 
•of fruit. 
Difficulties of all sorts occurred only to be overcome. The 
fruit when packed has hitherto been sent by road to Saltash 
■station, a distance of nine miles, or by water to Plymouth, and 
special arrangements had to be made with the various railway 
•companies to ensure the early delivery of the fruit at the great 
tnorthern markets, and by such early delivery to command the top 
market price. The procuring of “punnets” was so difficult that 
Mr. Lawry often had to run up to London by night in the middle 
of the season to procure them. This led to the home manufacture 
of the punnets, and has given rise to quite an important local 
industry in the little village of Boetheric, near which the farm lies, 
women and children employing their spare time in the winter 
months in the work, and making quite a comfortable addition to 
4;he family earnings. 
Instances of the healthy influence upon the surrounding district 
•of Mr. Lawry’s success, as it has raised up a host of imitators, and 
•as the action of landlords in the extension of fruit farming has 
often been in question, we quote in full an instance of such action 
and its results in Cornwall. “ Four or five years ago about 30 acres 
•of coppice wood called Brent Wood was cleared and converted 
into Strawberry and fruit gardens. It was let off in plots of the 
proverbial 3 acres extent, and from being worth 8s. to 10s. an acre 
as coppice, is now let at £5 to £6 an acre on ten years’ leases. 
The landlord sold the coppice ; but the tenants, who in some cases 
were labourers, cleared the land, then limed it at the rate of 
439 bushels per acre, took a crop of Potatoes, and afterwards 
planted Strawberries. The landlord has provided some fruit trees, 
and has the right to purchase any found by the tenants, who have 
to maintain trees and plants when once attached to the soil. 
Twenty-five two-horse cartloads of dung have to be applied to each 
plot yearly, for which there is a wharf on the riverside about three- 
quarters of a mile away. The labour of clearing, which has been 
done mainly by the tenants themselves, and entirely at their 
expense, is estimated at £20 per acre, and the annual weeding is 
put at £5 per acre. In the first year of produce as much as £300 
has been received for sales from some of the plots; but out of 
this must be deducted £50 to £70 for cultivation, picking, and 
something for railway and land carriage. Sometimes 100 and 
occasionally 200 persons may be seen gathering fruit on this 
reclaimed land. The first crops, however, have been in excess of 
all succeeding ones,’’ which last fact, we take it, shows a proba¬ 
bility of crowded growth among the Strawberries, and a lack of 
plant food in the soil. To prevent premature exhaustion in young 
Strawberry beds there is in our experience nothing like heavy 
soakings of sewage immediately after the fruit is cleared off in 
autumn, and again in spring from the commencement of growth 
onwards till the fruit begins colouring. 
WOR-K ON THE HOME FARM. 
Hedges and ditches ought certainly to be set in thorough order this 
winter during the enforced cessation of so much other work by the long 
frost. We do not advise the planting of young Whithethorn in the gaps 
of old hedges, as they seldom if ever answer, and prefer to plash the 
entire hedge, using sufficient stakes and binders to make all firm. 
Where new hedges are required the land may be got ready now, and the 
planting done immediately after the weather becomes open again. We 
do not hold with a slavish following of the old ditch and ditch mound 
for all hedgerows. By all means make ditches wherever they are 
required for drainage, but we otherwise altogether prefer planting on 
the flat in well trenched ground, using sturdy robust plants, and plant¬ 
ing them in a single line from G to 10 inches apart, according to the 
size of the plants. 
For general purposes Whitethorn makes an excellent hedge when 
really well managed, but neither it nor any other hedge will continue in 
good order long without regular attention. To have a dense lateral 
growth in a hedge we must clip it twice a year. A single annual clipping 
answers fairly well, but the result will not bear comparison with that 
from twice clipping, that is, after spring growth, and again in autumn. 
Plant well this season, leave the plants undipped till the second winter 
after planting, then cut them down to within G inches of the ground. 
In the following spring they will send up plenty of vigorous growth, 
and the clipping must then begin. We have planted the Myrobalan 
Plum extensively for plantation hedges, and find it makes a thoroughly 
strong compact hedge of any height, from 5 to 10 feet or upwards if 
required. It must be clipped quite as regularly and carefully as White¬ 
thorn, for its growth is so rampant that it soon gets out of bounds if 
left to itself for a season or two. It bears clipping perfectly well, and 
we have seen plenty of its pretty yellow fruit upon a closely clipped 
hedge. Owing to its singularly vigorous growth it forms a good hedge 
quickly, for which reason preference is given it for outer boundaries, 
yet we fail to see where it can be considered out of place if only due 
attention is given it after the planting. Gorse hedges are very pretty 
on raised banks, but they are so liable to suffer from frost that they are 
not to be depended upon for general purposes. 
METEOROLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS. 
CAMDEN SQUARE, LONDON. 
Lat. 51° 32' 40" N.; Long. 0° 8' 0" 'W.; Altitude, 111 feet. 
DATE. 
9 AM. 
IN THE DAY. 
Hygrnme- 
0 . 
Shade Tern- 
Radiation 
a 
1191. 
ter. 
. ^ 
perature. 
Temperature. 
January. 
ss:: 
In 
On 
Dry. 
Wet. 
P o 
Max. 
Min, 
sun. 
grass 
Inches. 
deg 
deg. 
deg. 
deg. 
deg. 
deg. 
deg. 
In. 
Sunday. 
4 
30.061 
34.6 
N.W. 
33.8 
87.2 
58.0 
43.6 
25.-2 
— 
Monday. 
5 
30.210 
28.8 
27.7 
u. 
83.9 
36.1 
27.9 
60.1 
21.9 
— 
Tuesday .... 
a 
30.391 
26.1 
25.1 
N. 
33.9 
30.7 
23.8 
45.6 
19.2 
— 
Wednesday.. 
7 
3'.292 
2.5.3 
24.9 
N. 
33.7 
32.2 
23.1 
48.9 
19.7« 
0.070 
Thursday.... 
8 
30.034 
21.8 
24.1 
N. 
33.2 
88.7 
22.3 
44.8 
22.3 
— 
Friday . 
9 
S'l.llS 
28.1) 
28.3 
S E. 
33.2 
80.9 
24.1 
41.2 
17.2 
Saturday .... 
10 
30.605 
2J.3 
20.1 
F. 
33.0 
30.3 
18.7 
41.8 
13.4 
— 
30.230 
27.1 
26.4 
33.5 
33.0 
23.9 
47.0 
20.3 
0.070 
* Covered by snow. 
EEMABKS. 
4'h —Rain about 4 A.M.; fair day with some sun.shine ; thawing throuehout. 
6th.—Sharp frost early ; cloudlt-ss morning, and blight sunshine till 3 P.M., then one Or 
two flukes of snow; brilliint cold night, 
fith.—Bright and cold. 
Tiii.—Bright .'•nn till 11 A.M., then overcast; heavy snow showers at 3 I’.M., and snow 
at n‘ght. 
8 h.—Snow !•! inch deep at 9 A M. ; fine with faint snnsli'ne. 
9tli.—Fine, with the snn shining through haze or slight fog. 
lutu.—Slight fog, with the sun showing through early ; bright afternoon. 
Another week of hard frost, bat in ground covered by snow the temperature at 1 foot 
deep, is still 1? above freezing point. Barometer ve^y high at the end of the week.— 
G. J. feYMONa. 
