Worcester daily spy. [volume] (Worcester [Mass.]) 1850-1888, 1860-08-21


1t is to be regretted, when it is considered
how easily this fruit is cultivated, how rich it
is in the elements of food, what luxury it is,
and how conductive to health, that its cultiva-
ton should not be more general. The quaint
ties brought into New York the past season
have been immense and other cities, and
perhaps the large villages, are now pretty well
supplied but in the rural districts the very
place where it can be the most cheapy pro.
duced, and where, owing to the prevailing
styles of living, it is most needed, its cultlva-
ton is too much neglected A few wild
Strawberries less every year, as the country
becomes older seems to satisfy, and the choice
varieties wonderfully improved by cultivation,
are neglected
Among farmers, and mechanics as well, if
they have but patch of land, strawberries
can be grown to the greatest advantage.
Why should they not be grown in abundance?
1t need not take time from the solid business
Of those strong to labor In many families
there are the aged, and in more the young
Grandpa as left the field, but he loves to
work little i'll the garden; and Willy and
Mary will hurry home from school TO pick the
berries, and not charge a tarthing for that
'S'abor; and you will hear Mary calling Willy
TO "come here and see, for she has found
Wilson's Seeding as large as her mothers
thImbe and Willy vociterates joyfully as he
finds Rockers Seeding as large as big
plum and then Mary beats him all out with a
Longworth's Prolific next, Willy, not to be
beat, outdoes the whole, on wnopping Jenny
Lind, large enough to fire at a squirrel six
rods off, if there is no better use for it, The
little hearts came up in the threats, to think
how pleased the mother will be, and how the
fathers eyes will stare when he comes in to
tea and sees such monster berries on the table,
I'D,
gether, and the little folks have been most
pleasantly kept out oil mischief till just tired
enough to take their supper and go to bed,
and grow toward the childrens' good of being
great men and women" How pleasant and
useful, could every family have good straw
berry plot.
Ii the growing of this fruit were difficult
and costly operation, and if success, when
undertaken, were as rare as angels visits, no
more need be said. But there is no difficulty
in the case and as to the cost, il is almost
nothing We get them in this city, after the
carriers and the hucksters have made more
money on them than the grocers get, about as
cheap as any food we can find, viewing them
simply as food and looking at them only with
an economical eye. How much need they
cost the country resident, and how much better
are his berries than ours, because his children
bring them fresh from the garden to the table,
while ours have been sold and re sold, summed
and wilted and often commenced to decay 1t
is now a settled point, that strawb berries can be
grown as cheapy as Indian corn, aside from
the picking, which, for family use, cost Just
nothing. Half rood has often produced a
bushel and it is considered nothing to Drag
of, to take a bushel from rood. The manure
required is, if anything, less than for corn;
and the labor is not much more, provided you
know how to do the work as Thoroughly and
yet economically in one case as in the other.
Very brief directions are all that is needed
by farmers and country mechanics, already
acquainted with the general principles of cul-
tivating the soil and growing crops.
Select a soil rather moist-and soil that
would grow crop of cortland plough and
spade it to the depth of one foot or little
more. If a portion of the plot is somewhat
shaded, your strawberry season will be pro-
longed, as the shaded part will mature its
fruit later than the sunny side Of the plot, and
later ON the shady, your season for enjoying
the fruit will be heightened to the best part of
two months. Old, well decomposed manure,
black with age and exposure, is recommended
for straw berries. II you say this is the very
thing you cannot spare from your wheat field,
the answer is, you can grow Strawberries just
as well without it. SundM, recipes haYe been
put forth for How'd dressings, compounded of
}
rides in existence, antfh0d0&bt tltbX nc good !;
but these you need not trouble yoQnGAo4d with.
The truth is the mantring for Strawberries is
very easy and cheap. 4
Leafmold gathered fronathe woods, or
swampweed dug few months Beforehand and
exposed to air, rain and sunshine, and wood
ashes afford all the elements of the strawberry.
If you plough in liberal allowance of this
compost, and then sow on IL few ashes every
spring, 1t will be long before yonr crop will
IAN Tor the want of manure, and then more of
the same will be all that will be needed. 1t is
mistake TO suppose that tie best manure of
Inc larn, ana in large quantities, must be alb
straGieu Tor the strawberry plot.
Ahere are various ways Of proceeding with
the cultivation, many of which NAV be good.
but not all can be the best. If, after bringing
the sullace 10 nice level filth, you set the
rows two feet apart, and the plants one foot in
the row, there can be great error so far no
not raise the hills above the general level in
setting, and let the cultivation be surh as 80
keep the entire surface as nearly level ms NM,
be- If the plants are set now, in August onJ
the ground be kept clean, the runners will
take root in considerable numbers this fail
and in great numbers next spring, and a nret'
ty good crop (more than half Of a large onel
may be obtained in ten months from the SET.
ting. Some would let them occupy the whole
ground and then they would become a perfect
thickct, and would give an immense crop the
second year, but would be more difficult 10
keep clean afterwards. Others prefer to con
fine the plants TO II foot in width leaving one
foot vacant between thus stripping the plot
with an alternate foot Of vines, and u vacant