n8 
FLORIDA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 
and then tops. Tops give the largest 
crop and the most uniform season of 
ripening, and they are safest for a 
novice to use. On the other hand we 
often get three crops from shoots 
while we are getting two from a top 
planting. 
The main harvest season comes in 
summer, there is a secondary ripening 
in winter or early spring, and there 
are scattering fruit all the rest of the 
year. 
In most weather at least crowns and 
slips really need no stripping to grow 
pretty well. But all the sorts of plants 
root more quickly and uniformly when 
stripped. It is not good practice to 
neglect this slow job. The knobs that 
are fleshy are cut off the end of the 
slips when prepared for planting, but 
the plants are all shucked sidewise, 
the leaves coming off together. Shuck¬ 
ing sidewise damages the stalk of the 
plant least. A shoot may be mostly 
shucked in one operation if three or 
four of the bracts or leaves are started 
along up the plant. The thumb is 
mainly used in this side shucking. We 
never shuck up into the fender stalk 
of the shoot beyond the showing of 
brown; or beyond the biggest diameter 
of the stalk in slips in tops. I like best 
fresh plants, fresh shucked for plant¬ 
ing.- If mealy bug is present all plants 
are dipped in whale oil soap, using i 
pound to eight gallons of water. 
For marking the row a cable clothes 
line is used, and the space between 
plants is indicated on it by a few wraps 
of wire inserted between the line 
strands, thus securing its position. The 
planting is done on that side of the line 
that will leave it unimpeded, when the 
line is moved to mark the next row. 
A good idea for a line stake is an iron 
one made of a half inch rod, with a 
cross piece welded to the middle, to 
serve as a shoulder for the foot in 
forcing it into the ground. This saves 
time and trouble. The stake needs to 
be about three feet long. 
A grub mattox is used in planting. 
The mattox man swings the pick into 
the ground and pulls it towards him, 
his assistant inserts the plant behind 
the mattox before the dirt has a chance 
to partially fill the hole. The mattox 
man then makes a little jab to bring 
dirt to the inserted plant. Packing the 
soil about these plants is worse than a 
waste of energy. 
This team of two men will mark and 
plant (but not distribute) 5,000 plants 
a day. The tops are put in as deeply 
as possible without getting dirt into the 
center. The shoots are planted six to 
eight inches deep. 
A day’s planting and preparation of 
plants is being systematized here as 800 
shoots, or 1,000 slips, or 1,200 tops per 
man of the gang. 
The ripe pines are brought out of 
the field in two trays slung to a shoul¬ 
der pole, the tops are removed and the 
fruit are loaded into boxes at the road¬ 
side to go to the cannery scales. This 
Japanese method of moving the pines 
out of the field seems hard to improve 
on. 
The pine is a fastidious plant. If 
conditions are at all off, the plant loses 
interest in life. Land that has been 
