Any land that will grow a crop of grain or vegetables will do for Raspberries. There are four families of these, namely: "The Reds," "The Blacks," "The Pinks," and "The Yellows," all requiring the same general treatment. The yellow varieties are used almost exclusively for family use and have little if any value for commercial purposes. The Red Raspberries and the Black Raspberries, commonly called Black Caps, are extensively cultivated for market where there is usually a good demand for the fruit at remunerative prices. The Pink varieties are grown largely and almost entirely for canning purposes both by the home people and those with large factories. All are good in their natural state for table use, and when a dozen plants of each are set in the garden we can enjoy this delicious fruit for four to five weeks. We should arrange our selection of varieties to prolong the season for fruit as much as possible, not neglecting that important consideration of best quality when the aim and purpose is to supply our own table. Prepare the ground and manure it the same as you would for strawberries; then make furrows six feet apart and set your plants in these two feet apart, taus forming a continuous row of fruiting, which gives one third more fruit than could be had from the quite generally abandoned old hill system. Cut back the plants to within six inches from the ground. Set posts twenty feet apart and run one wire 31/2 feet from the ground, and train your fruiting cane to the wire. This is the cheapest and best method and is being adopted now quite generally. The canes should be pruned back to within branches should be pruned five feet from the ground and the lateral back to fifteen inches.

The Bush System of growing Raspberries of all kinds is to plant in furrows three feet apart. The plants should be trained in bush form; this is clone by Summer pruning or pinching back of the leader and lateral branches. The leader or main branch should not be over three and one-half feet from the ground; the lateral branches should be started near the surface of the soil and should not be more than eighteen inches in length. It requires considerable pinching back during the growing season to make a plant of this formation, but it is the only pruning needed and the bush goes into Winter weather in good robust condition. There is no necessity to use posts and wire or anything else to trail to, when this method of growing is adopted, as the plants are strong, bushy and vigorous and well able to hold up their fruit from the soil. In the large Raspberry fruiting districts this system of growing is used almost exclusively. The severe annual pruning back has a tendency to make the plants short lived, and plantations cultivated under this treatment rarely last more than five or six years at the best. With the continuous row system of fruiting the plants will be at their best for ten to twelve years. In any case, the old wood should be cut out each year. This can be done any time after the fruit is gathered until along in the following Spring. The first year that Raspberries are set we can crop the ground between the rows with any of the low growing vegetables like Potatoes, Beets and their kindred. The plants will come into fruiting the first year after being planted and under ordinary favorable conditions should produce quite a full crop of fruit; they will then need the use of all the land. Fertilizers should be used while planting and afterwards of the same kinds and in the same quantities per acre as for Strawberries. A light application of well rotted manure on the surface of the ground around the plants during the Winter months is very beneficial.

* Winter Protection

-- In some of the cold Northern climates the Raspberry occasionally winter kills. Where this is apt to occur it is the practice to lay down the fruiting canes in November or December and cover one-half or more of it from the tip end with soil. This covering need not be heavy. This is resorted to when the fruit is grown for the family use; it is quite too expensive when we are growing fruit with a view to profit for commercial purposes, yet we find a few large growers protecting their Raspberries in this way; they, however, use the old hill method of fruiting, leaving four to six canes in each hill and tieing them to small stakes. These hills are planted four feet apart in the furrows, two plants set together in each hill; the distance between the rows should be six feet, then, of course, this protection can be practiced with the continuous row system of fruiting, however, not with the bushy plant method, as it would be impossible to lay these stocky plants down for this purpose. Be it remembered, however, that it is only in rare instances where it is necessary to go to the expense and trouble of this Winter covering of the canes with soil. We have a good list of old reliable hady standard varieties of American origin that will rarely be winter killed. These will be carefully selected and named hereafter.

* Anthracnoce

-- This is a fungus disease that occasionally attacks the canes of the Raspberry close to the ground. The canes become brown and rusty and should be removed at once and burned, otherwise it will infest the entire plantation. When it first attacks the plant you can notice the results from it on the foliage which becomes sickly looking.

* Cane Blight

-- This is also a fungus disease and attacks the canes in all parts, the wood turning black and shriveling away. The part of the canes thus affected should be cut away and at once burned.

If at any time your plants show signs of leaf rust, spray at once with the Bordeaux Mixture, without the Paris Green. You should not spray while the plants are in fruiting.

* Spraying

-- This should be attended to in the early Spring before vegetation starts, using the Bordeaux Mixture without the Paris Green. When this spraying is thoroughly done at this season there is little danger from any of the fungus troubles heretofore named.

* Varieties

-- The selection of varieties hereafter named is on the whole the result of years of practical experience and experiments by the author. We have endeavored to give the very best list graded from a host of sorts, many of which have been quite generally discarded and others that are still on the list but of comparatively little value.