458 
THE  RURAL  NEW-YORKER 
July  16 
Great  Pacific — At  its  best.  Variable  shape,  conical, 
round  and  Sharpless  shape.  Fair  quality,  dark  red 
outside  and  inside.  Strong-  vines.  P.  II. 
Saunders. — Crescent  shape,  often  as  two  joined  to¬ 
gether,  medium  quality,  crimson,  prolific,  but  not  re¬ 
markable  in  any  way.  B.  I. 
Gen.  Putnam. — At  its  best.  Fair  quality,  soft,  light 
scarlet.  Valuable  as  an  early  home  berry.  4P.  II. 
Tippecanoe. — At  its  best.  Large  average  size,  heart- 
shape  or  variable.  Fair  quality,  soft. 
Lady  Ilusk. — Variable  form,  as  if  two  or  three  were 
joined  together.  Often  hollow.  Not  an  acquisition. 
Parker  Earle. — Ripening.  Soft. 
Yale,  Timbrell,  Clara  and  Eureka  are  late.  Eureka 
is  much  like  Clara,  but  more  productive.  Many  berries 
of  the  largest  size,  all  irregular.  Quite  firm,  fair 
quality.  A  trial  is  recommended  as  a  late  kind.  B.  IIII. 
Lovett’s  Early. — Now  ripening  freely.  Generally 
of  good  shape,  varying  from  conical  to  heart-shape 
and  winged.  Scarlet  to  crimson  in  color.  Fair 
quality  and  fairly  firm.  The  wet  season  should  be 
considered. 
Junk  15. — What  berries  are  most  productive  to-day  ? 
Shuster,  Farnsworth,  Jucunda  Improved,  Wolverton, 
Pacific,  Gen.  Putnam,  a  fine  berry  in  every  way  except 
that  it  is  not  very  firm  ;  Beebe,  of  the  largest  size  and 
good  quality;  Lovett’s  Early,  now  large  and  produc¬ 
tive,  though  not  of  first  quality  ;  Brandywine,  of  im¬ 
mense  size  and  fine  quality,  quite  firm  and  shapely 
for  so  large  a  berry. 
Timbrell,  Yale,  Parker  Earle,  Clara,  Eureka,  Mary 
and  Gandy  are  later  than  June  15. 
Brandywine. — From  Edward  T.  Ingram,  Marshall¬ 
town,  Pa.,  August,  1891. — First  picking  this  date. 
Foliage  of  the  largest  and  thriftiest,  entirely  free  of 
scald  or  blemish.  Heavy  peduncles.  The  average 
size  is  as  large  as  any  ever  raised  here  and  the  shape 
is  more  uniformly  good  than  that  of  any  other  of  the 
largest  varieties.  In  general  it  is  heart-shape,  often 
broadly  so,  without  neck.  Its  most  pronounced  irreg¬ 
ularity  inclines  towards  a  Sharpless  shape,  occasion¬ 
ally  as  of  two  berries  joined  together.  Calyx  and  sepals 
broad  and  many.  Medium  red,  flesh  red,  firm  and 
solid  for  so  large  a  berry — none  more  so.  Quality  not 
the  best,  but  fully  as  good  as  Sliarpless  and  better  than 
Eubach.  Vines  exceedingly  prolific.  The  best  berry 
in  our  collection  of  this  season  up  to  date.  B.  IIII. 
Mary.- — From  H.  H.  Alley,  Hilton.  N.  J.,  July,  1891. 
— With  the  originator  this  variety  bears  berries  which, 
taking  the  average,  are  the  largest  the  writer  has  ever 
seen.  It  is  not  at  its  best  here,  however.  The  medium¬ 
sized  berries  are  regular,  lieart-slianed  without  neck, 
the  tip  being  more  or  less  truncated  or  broadly  round. 
The  largest  berries  are  often  fan-shaped,  the  flesh 
sometimes  nearly  meeting  about  the  stem,  the  calyx 
in  the  middle  forming  nearly  a  flattened  ball  of  flesh, 
so  to  speak.  Color  medium  to  rather  dark  red,  flesh 
dark,  seeds  dark.  Quality  acid.  P.  II. 
Yale. — From  S.  Hoyt  &  Son,  New  Canaan.  Ct.,  Sep¬ 
tember,  1888. — Late  and  productive  of  berries  of  good 
size  and  excellent  quality.  Vines  low,  peduncles  short. 
Nearly  P.  II. 
Timbrell. — A  peculiarity  of  this  remarkable  berry 
is  a  patchiness  in  coloring  as  it  ripens — a  patch  of  red 
and  a  patch  of  white.  The  shape — it  might  almost 
be  considered  characteristic — is  often  sharply  triangu¬ 
lar  :  some  broadly  and  evenly  truncate,  with  one  side 
more  pronounced  than  the  other,  as  shown  in  the  illus¬ 
tration,  Fig.  200.  The  peduncles  are  strong,  bearing 
many  berries.  The  foliage  is  fine — splendid.  The  berry 
is  solid,  firm  and  of  nearly  the  highest  quality.  The 
flesh  is  sweet  and  excellent  as  soon  as  the  berry  begins 
to  color.  As  a  late  berry,  we  predict  that  the  Tim¬ 
brell  has  a  future.  It  may  also  be  prized  as  a  late 
medium  crop. 
Lovett’s  Early  is  now  at  its  best.  Peduncles  slender, 
the  foliage  concealing  most  of  the  berries.  Often 
Crescent  shape.  Fair  quality,  solid,  firm,  red  flesh, 
productive.  Vigorous  plants. 
Gandy. — Ripening  freely.  It  will  be  seen  that 
Lovett’s  Early  is  rather  late.  Gandy  is  of  good  shape 
and  quality,  but  not  very  productive. 
Brandywine  continues  a  long  time  in  fruit,  and  is 
of  superior  shape,  quality  and  size  for  so  large  a  berry. 
Foliage  perfect. 
June  16. — Timbrell  at  its  best.  Finest  quality, 
highly  productive,  firm  notwithstanding  others  are 
soft  and  rotting.  The  best  of  its  season  in  this  col¬ 
lection,  all  things  considered.  It  is  again  noted  that  it 
is  sweet  and  excellent  before  it  is  ripe.  The  sharp 
point  of  the  pistil  remains  over  the  seed  as  if  to  pro¬ 
tect  the  surface  of  the  berry. 
Parker  Earle.  Season,  seems  to  have  been  too  wet 
for  it.  Berries  soft  and  comparatively  few. 
June  17. — Most  kinds  rotting  because  of  hot,  showery 
weather. 
June  19. — Gandy  is  now  at  its  best.  Berries  large, 
heart-shape, good  quality,  firm,  but  not  very  productive. 
Iowa  Beauty  still  in  bearing  and  of  excellent  qual¬ 
ity  and  regular  heart-shape.  Quite  firm.  Its  produc¬ 
tiveness  cannot  fairly  be  estimated  this  season.  In 
all  other  respects  it  is  an  admirable  berry.  Resembles 
Jucunda  Improved. 
Jucunda  Improved.  Still  in  bearing.  Fine  quality. 
Saunders.  Still  in  bearing.  Berries  of  but  medium 
size,  but  of  regular  shape  ;  firm  and  solid.  Fair  qual¬ 
ity. 
Great  Pacific.  Still  in  bearing.  Berries  small,  firm, 
poor  quality. 
Wolverton  is  bearing  freely.  Berries  regular,  heart- 
shape,  quite  firm  and  of  medium  size.  Hoard  nearly 
past.  Lady  Rusk  still  bearing,  quite  firm,  fair  quality. 
Yale.  Now  at  its  best.  It  is  a  good  late  variety  as 
to  yield  and  quality,  but  the  berries  ripen  imperfectly. 
Berries  often  a  dark  red  on  one  side  and  over-ripe,  and 
a  light  red  on  the  other.  Low  vines,  low  peduncles. 
Timbrell  is  the  best  of  this  date,  the  most  productive 
of  berries  of  the  largest  size  and  best  quality.  The  one 
failing  thus  far  developed  is  that  the  ripening  berries 
are  mottled  instead  of  a  uniform  color.  This  is  no 
disadvantage  for  home  use  since  the  half-ripe  berries 
9,re  sweet  and  of  the  real  strawberry  flavor. 
Cloud’s  Seedling. — Still  bearing.  Small. 
Beebe. — Still  bearing  berries  of  large  size,  though  a 
trifle  soft. 
Eureka. — Still  bearing  abundantly.  Medium  to 
large;  variable  in  shape,  soft  and  of  only  fair  quality. 
(It  and  Clara  are  bearing  as  many  berries  as  any  other 
kinds.) 
Lovett’s  Early — that  is  to  say,  Lovett’s  Late — is 
bearing  lots  of  fruit  more  regular  in  shape  than  those 
borne  earlier,  firm  and  of  fair  quality.  On  the  whole, 
it  is  disappointing. 
Brandywine  still  bearing  many  large  berries  of  reg¬ 
ular  shape  and  good  quality.  It  is  a  fine  variety. 
June  22. — Clara,  Eureka,  Yale  and  Timbrell  are  the 
most  productive  of  this  date. 
Swindle. — Healthy  vines,  bearing  well  for  spring 
plants.  Berries  bright,  medium  red,  quite  firm,  regu¬ 
lar  form,  often  Crescent  shape,  apparently  high  qual¬ 
ity.  It  seems  to  begin  to  ripen  in  mid-season  and  to 
continue  late. 
Beebe,  Eureka,  Clara,  Yale,  Timbrell,  Gov.  Hoard, 
Wolverton  and  Gandy  still  bearing. 
Shuster’s  Gem  begins  early  and  lasts  late. 
June  26. — Gandy,  Saunders  (foliage  burning),  Wal¬ 
ton,  (foliage  burning),  Yale,  Timbrell,  Beebe,  Eureka, 
Clara,  Brandywine  and  Swindle  still  in  bearing. 
Eureka  and  Clara  bear  most  at  this  date.  Swindle  is 
firm  and  of  good  quality. 
. I  une  27. — Frequent  rains  have  destroyed  many 
berries.  Yale  and  Timbrell  are  the  latest  berries  of 
good  quality.  Eureka  and  Clara  the  latest  of  inferior 
quality. 
Some  Remarks  and  a  Summary. 
For  one  reason  or  another,  we  are  unable  to  make 
any  report  upon  the  following  varieties:  Plants  from 
J.  O.  Nigh,  New  Cassel,  Wis.,  not  named;  Thompson 
Nos.  9,  64  and  81 ;  Bell,  Yankee  Doodle,  Van  Deman, 
E.  P.  Roe,  Auburn,  Gillespie,  Leviathan,  Princess, 
Latest  of  All,  Belle  Bordelaise,  Brunette,  Princeton 
Chief,  Street,  Arkansaw  Traveler,  Perfection,  and 
Smith’s  Nos.  4  and  5. 
As  the  outcome  of  The  R.  N.-Y.’s  strawberry  ob¬ 
servations  of  the  past  season,  what  kinds  are  to  be 
commended  to  its  readers  as  worthy  of  trial ;  as  being 
notably  or  in  some  ways  better  than  the  old  kinds 
with  which  its  readers  are  familiar  ?  If  a  new  variety 
is  no  better  than  the  strawberries  we  have  been  grow¬ 
ing,  it  is  to  be  condemned.  It  is  a  waste  of  time  and 
money  to  buy  high-priced  new  strawberry  plants  if  we 
do  not  buy  something  that  is  new  ;  something  that  we 
did  not  have  before. 
A  good  deal  has  been  said  of  Michel’s  Early.  It  is 
early,  and  that  is  the  most  that  may  be  said  of  it.  As 
a  market  berry,  it  is  without  value,  for  the  reason  that, 
long  before  it  is  ripe,  the  market  is  well  supplied  from 
the  South  with  larger  and  better  berries.  For  home 
use,  it  will  give  moderately  good  berries  of  fair  size 
two  or  three  days  earlier  than  any  other  variety  tried 
here.  Beder  Wood  (Racster)  follows  it  closely,  and 
while  of  as  good  quality  and  as  large,  is  more  produc¬ 
tive.  For  home  use,  we  would  prefer  Gen.  Putnam  to 
either. 
Shuster  (Shuster's  Gem)  is  to  be  commended  for 
earliness,  size,  hardiness  of  vine,  long  life,  and  for 
continuing  to  bear  fruit  through  a  long  season.  These 
qualities  compensate,  in  a  measure,  for  a  defective 
strawberry  flavor.  Wolverton,  of  Canadian  origin,  is 
an  excellent  variety  which  begins  to  ripen  early  and 
continues  until  the  intermediates  are  at  their  best. 
The  two  new  berries  which  we  would  specially  com¬ 
mend  to  our  readers  are  Brandywine  and  Timbrell. 
Both  are  abundant  bearers,  healthy  and  vigorous  vines. 
Of  the  two,  Brandywine  will,  perhaps,  please  the  mar¬ 
ket  best,  because  the  berry  ripens  in  every  part 
uniformly,  while  the  Timbrell  colors  unevenly.  If  we 
allowed  ourselves  to  form  positive  conclusions  from  a 
single  season’s  trial  and  were  desirous  of  setting  out  a 
new  bed  for  home  use,  we  would  plant,  of  all  the 
varieties  in  our  present  collection,  the  Timbrell  and 
the  Brandywine  ;  and  if  confined  to  but  one  of  the 
two,  we  would  choose  the  Timbrell  on  account  of  its 
excellent  quality. 
Is  there  any  corelation  between  large  and  small 
flowers  and  large  and  small  berries  ?  Except  as  to 
pistillates  as  compared  with  bisexuals  we  may  not  say 
that  there  is.  Some  of  the  largest  bisexual  flowers  do 
not  give  the  largest  berries  and,  conversely,  the  small¬ 
est  perfect  flowers  sometimes  give  large  berries.  We 
feel  justified  in  concluding,  however,  that  the  pistillate 
flowers  average  smaller  than  the  bisexual  flowers, 
whether  the  fruit  be  small  or  large. 
*  * 
More.  Strawberry  Talk. —  My  experience  with 
Lovett’s  Early  Strawberry  does  not  agree  with  The 
R.  N.-Y.’s.  I  set  out,  on  August  15,  1891,  a  bed  of 
strawberries  of  the  following  varieties :  Sharpless, 
Parker  Earle,  Middlefield,  Michel’s  Early,  Haverland, 
Nectar  and  Everbearing,  and  on  October  6,  I  set  out 
another  of  Lovett's,  Gandy  and  Bubach,  the  first 
being  pot-grown  plants,  the  others  layers,  and  Lovett’s 
was  one  of  the  first  to  ripen,  Middlefield,  Sharpless, 
Mitchel's  and  Haverland  ripening  at  the  same  time, 
Parker  not  having  ripened  any  as  yet.  w.  c.  Raymond. 
Abnormal  Eggs  ;  “  Double-Barreled  ” 
Chickens. 
The  science  of  embryology  is  comparatively  a  sealed 
book,  in  great  part,  and  must  remain  so  for  obvious 
reasons.  It  is  impossible  to  know  the  actual  process 
by  which  a  chick  is  hatched  from  an  egg,  and  until  we 
can  get  a  breed  of  hens  that  will  give  us  glass-covered 
eggs,  we  shall  probably  never  know  any  more  than  we 
do  now  of  what  goes  on  inside  an  egg.  But  we  do  know 
enough  to  be  sure  of  some  things,  and  one  is  that  a 
double-yolked  egg  is  not  likely  to  produce  twin 
chickens.  Such  an  egg  has  two  yolks,  but  rarely  two 
“whites.”  The  white  part  of  the  egg  is  the  material 
of  which  the  chick  is  made  up.  The  yolk  is  the  nutri¬ 
ment  only  of  the  young  animal,  and  we  know  some¬ 
thing  of  the  way  in  which  an  egg  is  built  up  that  makes 
it  appear  impossible  that  two  chicks  can  come  out  of 
one  egg.  First,  the  yolk  is  formed  in  the  ovary,  ami 
it  gradually  reaches  its  complete  form  before  it  is 
covered  with  the  several  layers  of  albuminous  sub¬ 
stances  in  which  it  is  enveloped.  Then  the  complete 
egg  is  covered  with  its  protecting  coat  of  shell. 
It  is  quite  possible  that  two  yolks  may  descend  the 
oviduct  at  the  same  time,  and,  if  the  yolk  were  the 
material  for  the  chicken,  there  might  be  twins.  This 
happens  in  the  mammalia,  at  times,  when  two  germs 
are  descending  the  oviduct  and  become  fertilized  by 
the  act  of  the  male,  and  in  such  cases  these  double 
germs  may  become  attached  together  and  form  what 
are  called  monstrosities,  such  as  calves  with  two  sets 
of  legs  attached  to  a  common  body.  The  Siamese 
twins  and  the  pair  now  on  exhibition  which  consist  of 
two  separate  bodies  and  intestines,  but  joined  only 
through  the  abdominal  parts  of  the  frame,  were  thus 
formed  ;  but  far  the  greater  part  these  fetuses  become 
altogether  malformed  and  are  simply  monstrosities, 
not  able  to  perform  any  vital  function  and  therefore 
never  live.  These  instances  are  not  uncommon  among 
the  mammalia  :  but  among  birds  the  method  of  fetal 
construction  is  different,  and  a  complete  double  egg  is 
hardly  possible.  The  hatched  chick  from  some  kind 
of  malformed  egg  might  possibly  have  two  sets  of 
limbs  wholly  or  in  part,  but  it  is  seemingly  impossible 
that  two  fully  and  perfectly-formed  birds  could  be  so 
produced. 
There  are  many  kinds  of  abnormal  eggs.  I  have 
found  several  such  in  my  experience.  An  egg  having 
another  inside  of  it,  is  not  an  impossibility  and  can  be 
easily  understood  from  what  is  known  of  the  way  eggs 
are  formed.  I  have  a  small  egg  in  which  is  another 
lying  loose,  so  that  it  rattles,  and  is  therefore  without 
a  second  albuminous  part.  There  is  evidently  a  smal¬ 
ler  egg  inside  of  the  outer  one,  and  a  second  shell  has 
been  formed  loosely  over  the  inner  one.  This  is  a  rare 
form  of  monstrosity,  and  1  have  not  known  of  any  but 
this  one.  I  have  found  several  instances  of  small  eggs 
having  only  the  yolk  inside  and  no  white.  This  too  is 
easy  to  understand,  as  the  yolk  descending  the  oviduct 
has  passed  on  without  having  any  albuminous  envelope 
deposited  on  it,  because  of  some  disorder  of  the  secret¬ 
ing  glands.  This  is  much  like  the  cause  of  the  soft 
eggs  frequently  laid  by  hens,  the  absence  of  the  shell 
beiug  due  to  the  inaction  of  the  special  organs  that 
secrete  the  limy  matter.  This  is  sometimes  due  to 
disease  and  often  no  doubt  to  want  of  the  material  in 
the  blood  of  the  hen,  a  result  of  inadequate  material 
in  the  food.  This  inability  is  most  frequent  in  very 
fat  hens,  the  high  condition  being  quite  likely  to 
produce  an  inflammatory  condition  of  the  membrane 
of  the  lower  part  of  the  oviduct,  where  the  shell 
material  is  secreted. 
\ 
