FLANSBURGH & PEIRSON CO.’S CATALOGUE. 
Strawberries in 1904 were, on the whole, a much less satisfactory crop than 
in 1903. This section produced many fine berries and abundant yields wherever 
the plants came through the winter uninjured, but here as elsewhere, in New 
York, Wisconsin, Iowa, from latitude 41 degrees north and farther south in 
Ohio, Indiana, Illinois and other sections east and west many fields of plants 
that had borne a crop the year before were badly winterkilled and the more vigor¬ 
ous new setting, though mulched in many cases, was more or less injured by 
the winter, and everywhere the crop was backward, often of inferior quality, and 
a short fruiting season. 
With twenty .years — growing strawberries here in Michigan, whatever the 
damage to less hardy fruits, our strawberries had always come through the hard¬ 
est winter in prime condition we regarded them as reliable in this section and 
as little liable to injury in the winter, on good upland, as the grass in our door 
yards, or neorly so, never having had a single plant thus injured. But when we 
came to dig for southern orders, on the higher ground that thawed out first 
in spring and where the deep snow had gone off so suddenly in February, leaving 
the ground bare, except for a thin coating of ice between the rows mostly, and 
exposed to the fierce winds and extreme cold which followed, we discovered that 
many of the plants in the slightly raised center of the rows, In the most ex¬ 
posed places, were injured in the roots and crown, and unfit to dig for sale. Un¬ 
fortunately some of our new varieties as well as a portion of the standards were 
thus situated, and though many of the plants that were rejected for sale, bore 
well at fruiting, others that were more injured did less, and it is hard to tell 
what they would havS done under normal conditions. We have learned that it is 
possible for a strawberry plant to winterkill under certain conditions, even in 
this most favored section, that mulching failed to save the plants in many places, 
and that in sections where there was less snow covering all winter the damage 
was often greater. That such extreme conditions may again prevail sometime 
is not impossible, but we trust the future, regarding this a crisis that is past, and 
not likely to re-occur in a generation. The acreage has been cut short through¬ 
out a wide section, but not so the demand for berries, which is ever increasing. 
Neither are our friends discouraged judging from the great inquiry throughout 
the season for plants to set next spring. We could have sold a good many thous¬ 
and for setting in the fall, if we could have spared the stock, but while we had 
a larger acreage, and the conditions in summer and early fall were all that 
could be desired for healthy vigorous growth, yet in the spring and early sum¬ 
mer it was not so favorable, and to dig large quantities in the growing season, 
destroying thousands of half grown plants for every thousand big enough to sell 
would have proved improfitable, even at advanced prices, in view of the greater 
wants than common in the spring. We can usually supply small lots of new or 
standard sorts for testing or otherwise after September 1st, by digging the first 
well rooted plants here and there in the row without disturbing the other plants 
very much, and we are glad to do what we can at ordinary times, to accommodate 
our customers by digging up the whole row as soon as a fair percentage of 
the plants are big enough if it will not leave us short of the variety for spring. 
Some varieties do not make plants freely until quite late in the season, and again 
the order may be for something of which we only grow a limited supply, when 
the orders are our own selection of varieties we can send the sorts we grow in 
largest quantity for fruit as well as plants, with less risk of being sold out too 
soon, and doubtless better satisfy the customer as well, for what does best for 
us is most likely to do the best for him. We dug 5,000 plants for a customer 
last fall, protesting we would rather send the full grown and better plants in 
THE NEW EATON BED RASPBERRY—SEE PAGE 24. 
