STRAWBERRY. 
upper. one,-—to apply a moderate dose of rather 
recent stable dung on the top of the lower spit,— 
to choose a good, free, turfy, velvety loam,—and 
to make the plantation during a moist state of 
the soil, in the early part of September. Some 
eminently successful cultivators, however, make 
their annual beds a month or so earlier than we 
recommend; and the Rev. T. Garnier, one of 
these, says in the Horticultural Society’s Trans- 
actions: “Karly in August, or as soon as the 
gatherings are over, I destroy all my beds, and 
proceed immediately to trench, form, and manure 
them to receive the plants for the crop of the 
ensuing year, taking care to select for that pur- 
pose the strongest and best-rooted runners from 
the old rejected plants. If at this season the 
weather should be particularly hot, and the sur- 
face of the ground much parched, I defer the 
operations of preparing my beds and planting 
them till the ground is moistened by rain, Such 
is the simple mode of treatment which I have 
adopted for three successive years; and I have 
invariably obtained upon the same spot a great 
produce of beautiful fruit, superior to that of 
every garden of the neighbourhood. Depth of 
soil I have found absolutely necessary for the 
growth and production of fine strawberries; and 
when this is not to be obtained, it is useless, in 
my opinion, to plant many of the best varieties. 
It is not generally known, but I have ascertained 
the fact, that most strawberries generate roots, 
and strike them into the ground nearly two feet 
in the course of one season. The pine and rose- 
berry succeed better than any other in stiff and 
shallow soils, but they should always lie in an 
open situation, and not, as is too commonly the 
practice, in shady and neglected parts of the 
garden.” | 
In the triennial course of making and manag- 
ing strawberry plantations, the preparing and 
manuring of the ground are the same as in the 
annual course. The planting may be done either 
in the form of single border rows, or in that of 
plots. Ifit be done in the former, the row should 
have an open space of from 12 to 18 inches of 
clear ground on each side of it; and the plants 
should be set by the trowel one foot asunder, 
securing the roots firmly in the soil, the fibres 
being expanded so as to be covered with earth 
in every part. If beds be adopted, the same dis- 
tances are to be maintained, but the rows must 
_be two feet asunder with alleys of approach by 
the sides laid with coal ashes. Water must be 
freely given from the rose of a water-pot in the 
evenings, till the plants stand firm and erect 
under the full sun; and afterwards the ground 
should be flat hoed, to bring the earth close 
around the base of each root, and to obliterate 
the smallest weed. In this system every blossom 
shown in the following spring is pinched off, not 
one plant being suffered to bear fruit in the first 
year; so that it will be proper to leave a few old 
beds to bear while the plan is in progress. The 
runners as they appear are cut away, and weeds are 
regularly destroyed. Throw a little fresh loam 
and a little reduced manure, mixed in equal pro- 
portions, along the rows on each side to enrich 
the ground while it protects the plants during 
winter; and in March take off the dead leaves 
and fork the spaces. This is to be the practice 
of each year. Suffer all the plants to bear in the 
second spring, and the crop will be in perfection : 
cut off runners and observe the other directions. 
In the third year the crop will be very fine; but 
now the end of the course is come, and the plants 
are to be rooted up. Therefore, to perpetuate 
the succession, new beds or rows must be begun 
every year, so that there shall always be a set of 
plants advancing through one or other of the 
stages. To provide new plants, a sufficiency of 
the finest runners of the third year’s plants must 
be allowed to fix themselves in the ground of the 
intervening spaces, keeping them apart from the 
old plants to benefit by full exposure to air and 
sun. 
A succession of fruit from plants in the open 
ground, during eight months of the year, or at 
the least during most of summer and a large 
part of autumn, is obtained partly by selecting 
varieties which naturally bloom and bear suc- 
cessively to one another,— partly by planting 
each in various aspects, as east, north, and 
south,—and partly by pinching off all the first 
flowers of early blooming varieties, so as to in- 
duce the natural bloom of the following spring 
to appear and fructify in the present autumn. 
All strawberry plants, howsoever situated, and 
whensoever expected or intended to bear, must 
be periodically or occasionally refreshed with 
water so as never to be allowed to become dry 
during the whole period from their beginning to 
show flowers till their ceasing to ripen fruit. All 
the varieties which are most liable to be dashed 
and sullied by heavy rains and plashy ground, 
must either be tied up or propped or otherwise 
protected by some artificial contrivance. One 
method is to lay slates or plain tiles along both 
sides of each row of plants,—and this not only 
keeps the fruit clean, but accelerates its ripening 
and improves its flavour; and another and more 
expensive and somewhat aristocratic method is 
to construct the strawberry beds of brick-work, 
in the form of a ridge of graduated steps, with 
interstices for the reception of the plants, and 
with a channel along the ridge for such an occa- 
sional or periodical application of water as will 
keep the soil beneath the bricks in the requisite 
state of moistness. 
When plants intended for forcing have been well 
established in small pots, and shifted into larger, 
they should be removed to some suitable place 
in the open garden, and plunged in the earth to 
the rims, and supplied with water as often as 
necessary to keep them in a continually growing 
state. In November, they may undergo another 
shift ; and at any time in January, from the ear- 
