Four or five screeners about each screen remove all trash and unsound berries, and sometimes the light-colored ones, which are held to “color up,” or packed separately and marked “Light.” As the barrels are being filled, they should be thoroughly shaken, at least three times; then, when the uninitiated packer thinks he has got the barrel full enough, it needs from four to six quarts more, when, with a screw, press the berries firmly down into the barrel. The barrels now properly headed and nailed, carry the berries in shape to command the highest price for which their grade may warrant. It pays to pack the fruit as solid as possible, since, whether sound or otherwise, a full barrel will sell when one lacking one inch or more of berries will command little attention.
West Harwich, Mass., Oct. 19, 1891.
In the spring of 1890 I bought an acre of cranberry bog that had been set about 30 years, and was so run down as to bear only about 10 barrels per year. I immediately applied 400 pounds of Bradley’s Fertilizer, and received the first year a crop of 22 barrels.
Last spring I applied 600 pounds of same Fertilizer, and have just gathered 40 barrels of nice berries, making an increase of 30 barrels a year on one acre by the use of Bradley’s Fertilizer, equal to 300 per cent. gain.
Besides all this improvement in the crop, the Fertilizer has had the effect to renew the vines to such an extent as to give them the appearance of a new bog, while the moss, which was quite troublesome, has been wholly killed out. It is surprising to see how quick moss will begin to disappear where Bradley’s Fertilizer has been applied.
W. P. BAKER.
THE 1891 CROP IN THE NEW ENGLAND STATES.
The following comparative statement of the 1891 crop of Cranberries on Dec. 1, 1891, in the New England States, was compiled by Charles H. Nye, Esq., Superintendent Cape Cod Division, Old Colony Railroad, and allowing that 9,000 bushels may have been grown in Rhode Island and Connecticut, would make the 1891 crop about or quite 480,000 bushels.