STRAWBERRY SPECIALIST 11 

The Commonwealth of Massachusetts 
STATE DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE 
Official Certificate No. 116 Boston, July 22, 1942 
To whom it may concern: 
This is to certify that I have this twenty-first day of 
July completed the inspection of the nursery stock of 
George Rennie grown at Argilla Road, Andover, State of 
Massachusetts, and find it to be apparently free from all 
injurious insects and diseases which might be transferred 
on nursery stock from the nursery to the orchard or garden. 
This certificate good until July 1, 1943. 
Inspected by B. I. Gerry (Signed) R. H. Allen, Director. 

SPACING OF PLANTS 
Most growers allow far too many plants to set 
in the row. We believe that the largest crops of the 
finest berries can be grown in rows two and a half 
to three feet wide with plants spaced seven or eight 
or even nine inches apart. Any plants that set closer 
than this should be treated as weeds and should be 
cut out with the hoe when hoeing the plants. Have 
one end of the hoe very sharp for this purpose. In 
the matted row you will find the most and largest 
berries are at the side of the rows. That is because 
they have more moisture than plants in the middle 
of the rows. In the spaced rows they have all the 
moisture they need to make large fruit. In the 
spaced rows you have very little rot as they dry off 
better after rain. You also get larger berries in a 
dry season. We have a customer on the North Shore 
that set out 500 Howard 17 plants. He allowed each 
plant to make only eight runners spaced nine inches 
apart and he picked from the 500 plants 1300 quarts 
“of berries. All the growers in that town are follow- 
ing this system now. Some growers may think this 
is too much work. Suppose you try spacing the 
