The Lynden tribune. [volume] (Lynden, Wash.) 1908-current, 1920-10-07

STRAWBERRIES
NEW VARIETIES MAKE POS
SIBLE CONTINUOUS CROP
OF THE LUCIOUS FRUIT
Kennydale Man Finds Ready Mar
ket for All He Can Produce.
Fall Rains Spoil Flavor and
End Season.

| Can we grow strawberries all the
year around? is very nearly answered
by some of the varieties of ever-bear-
l. ing plants now in the market which
are still in blossom when the fall
frosts catch them and are blooming
again in the spring about the time
the spinach begins to come out of the
ground. OF these several varieties
! have COME on the market including
the Americas, Suburban and Progress
sive of which the latter is seemingly
the best at least for the Puget Sound
gardens.
One trouble thar has been found in
the ever-bearing berries is their lack
of flavor and firmness, and it is in
those particulars that the Progressive
shows its value. Bred from the wild
strawberry it retains much OF that lit
tie fruits delicious bouquet although
it is very much larger.
The ever-bearing plants will not
continue to produce full sized berries
here on the Sound during the hot
|dry summers unless they are irrigat-
led and fertilized and in irrigating a
great deal of discretion must be used
mot to give them too much water as
they are very greedy and absorb the
moisture at the expense of their
flavor. Along in the fall when the
rains begin the berries are large and
look lucious, but they have no body
and about as much flavor as sweeten-
ed water. However, as soon as a dry
day or two comes on with little sun
shine they pick right up again and be-
gin delivering first class product.
Mr.. Charles, Hit of Kennydaie has
made extensive experiments in grow
ing this type of berries and has had
considerable success with them, al
though he has found the past summer
a hard one on account of the lack OF
sunny weather and the heavy rains
that came on in September just when
he expected to get his best crop.
Mr.. Hit started out with five or six
varieties, but after few years of try
ing them out he settled down to the
Progressive for his one bearer. He
lost a large part Of his plat of berry
plants last year through using fish
meal fertilizer. Fish meal attracts
worms and they gather gophers and
ho upnharc r.,1ipad hic match
On patch of 1900 plants which he
set out as runners last fall Mr.. Hit
picked 5000 worth of berries this sum-
mer up to the first of September. He
spoiled his crop. 1t has been the gen.
eral practice to transplant strawber-
ries in the spring giving them all win
ter for the green wood to set, but Mr..
Hit finds that with little extra
work he can get his plants to do all
right when he sets them out in the
fall and then they have the winter to
get their roots growing and become
settled in their new location. When
it freezes-if we have a cold winter
he has to go over the new patch and
press down the dirt around the small
plants to keep them from being push
ed out of the ground. When the rains
put him out of business Mr.. Hit was
finding ready market for his crop at
twenty-five cents a box and during the
few days of sunshine at the end of
September he found time to pick a
crate of berries that the sun had
sweetened and given flavor to.