Jasper Republican, Volume 1, Number 33, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 30 April 1875 — Strawberry Culture. [ARTICLE]

Strawberry Culture.

Tn cultivated strawberry has come to bee necessity for the mass, and it needs no apology for urging it* culture upon everyone wheown* araral habitation of a few feet of land that maybe appropriately applied to the purpose. BexuHly considered the strawberry is of three kinds: hermaphrodite, pistillate and staminate—the first being perfect ip itself to the production of fruit; the second requiring the aid of one of the other two; the third barren, not capable of producing perfect fruit. So»Z*.—Any soil where Indian corn will produce a crop will grow strawberries; still, like the former, the better the soil is prepared the better the crop; yet some varieties seem to elect a different soil from others; but there is no soil which will grow any plant bat that some variety may be grown thereon. The large and improved varieties require a rather moist, deep soil, than dry; especially is moisture necessary from the time of setting of blossoms and fruit to maturity of the same. Heavy and close soils should be under-drained, subsoiled and the mechanical condition rendered suitably porous. Sandy soils require applications of muck or black earth to retain moisture. Thorough culture of any soil is requisite for greatest production. Manure. — Compost manure seems best adapted for the strawberry. Muck, leaves, ashes, old pasture sods, applied alone or composted with good stable manure, are good. Mineral and phosphatic rather than animal fertilizers are to be preferred for application to the plants; top-dressing the soil about the hills is always beneficial. Time to Plani.—YAther early spring or September is the suitable season; but for Northern latitudes spring is the best or most successful. Plants carefully set in September will give a partial crop the next season; spring set will bear very few if any. All half-dead or defective leaves should be trimmed off, as also the roots pruned, before setting. Young runners are best for setting at any season. Planting. —Garden and field culture are very similar. In garden culture the plants are set in beds, three rows on each bed, rows eighteen inches apart, and plants eighteen inches apart in rows. Cloudy, moist weather is most suitable, but they can be set in any weather with suitable care. If set when dry a good soaking of pure water must be given each plant after setting in the soil. For field culture set your plants in rows thirty inches apart and plants eighteen inches in the row. Pistillate varieties will require every sixth row to be set with hermaphrodite varieties for fertilization. Keep perfectly free of weeds and well cultivated; keep the runners cut, or at most train Into the matted row system. The last is least trouble, and gives best results frequently, but the plantings will hold in bearing longer where the runners are kept cut clean. A good mulch soon after setting will preserve the plants from drought on dry soil. At the approach of winter it will benefit the plants to cover them and the whole soil with a light covering of straw or evergreen boughs; they winter better and are more productive the following season. If covered with straw it should be opened off the plants as soon as they start in the spring, to be left tfil afterjruiting; evergreen boughs removed entirely as soon as freezing weather is past. When the beds begin to fail new ones should be formed on new soil and the old ones occupied with some other crop for three or four years. New plants are grown by allowing the runners from plants to grow and strike root; and the second from parent plant is best for new plantations. Varieties are numerous. The following are good ones: Wilson’s Albany, H; New Jersey Scarlet, H; French’s Seedling, H; Peabody, H; Triomphe de Gand, H; Hovey, H; Jucunda, H; Bartlett, H; Durand’s Seedling, H; Lady’s Finger, H; Perry’s Seedling, H; MacAvdy’s Superior, P; Russell’s Prolific, P.— Cor. Hearth and Home.