Page:How and what to grow in a kitchen garden of one acre (IA howwhattogrowin00darl).pdf/172

 as does the straw mulching, from which the berry is generally supposed to take its name.

In selecting varieties choose those which are recommended as suitable for your soil, heavy or light, or such as have proved good in your immediate neighborhood, as some of the finest kinds are worthless in a different soil from that to which they are adapted. If especially fine, large berries are desired, the plants should be set in rows three feet apart, the plants twelve inches, as before, and all the runners kept cut off as fast as they appear. In this case heavy mulching is imperative, or the stools will be thrown out of the ground in the spring freezing and thawing. When the spring opens, the mulching should be cleared away from the crown of the plant, but should be allowed to remain on the ground surrounding the plant, as the weeds can easily be kept from such a patch, and fresh fertilizer applied. The patch may be continued in bearing for two or three seasons, but it will be found a great deal easier if a fresh patch is planted in new ground each year. This should be prepared in the early spring for use in the hills, and if it can be stacked in the fall and allowed to rot through the winter, it will be all the better. It can be composed of barnyard scrapings, well-rotted manure, chicken manure, night soil, or other strong fertilizer, mixed with at least an equal bulk of soil or ashes. This should be wet enough to rot thoroughly, but should not be allowed to lie