FORESTS AND FRUIT-GROWING. 195 



1 



ciousness, I believe, is becoming constantly greater as the country- 

 grows older. 



An inquiry, then, of much scientific interest, and of great material 

 importance, has reference to what may be the cause of this increasing 

 uncertainty of the fruit crop. In the early settlement of the country, 

 it was easy to grow peaches, even in localities where growing peaches 

 now seldom gladden the eye. In Ohio between the parallels of 40 and 

 41, for example, peach-buds were seldom injured by winter or spring 

 frosts, and the crop was abundant almost every year when the country 

 was " new." For the last twenty-five years peaches miss oftener than 

 they hit, and in many parts this has told so fearfully against the enter- 

 prise of production that scarcely a peach-tree is now to be seen. 



The clearing of the country had made this change. The continued 

 clearing of the country will increase the mischief still more. The grow- 

 ing of peaches and of most other fruits will be driven, as indeed it 

 already has been, to special localities and special soils. It is now for 

 such localities to look out m time and preserve as far as possible the 

 favorable conditions they now have, and if possible to increase them. 



More especial reference is here had to that part of our country 

 which lies north of the fortieth parallel, where most of the fruit-locali- 

 ties are to be found in the vicinity of considerable bodies of water. 



The water absorbs heat during the summer, which it slowly gives 

 off on the approach of cold weather, warming the atmosphere in its 

 vicinity, and preventing the occurrence of early frosts in the fall along 

 the shore-border from five to ten miles wide. This gives the wood 

 and buds a chance to mature thoroughly, so that they will endure a 

 harder freeze in the winter than wood and buds which were sudden- 

 ly stopped in the course of maturing by an early frost in the fall. 

 In the spring the waters warm more slowly than the land, and the 

 atmosphere thus chilled along this same shore-belt keeps back vege- 

 tation and fruit-buds so as greatly to lessen the danger from late 

 frosts ; and what may seem to be a contradiction, but is nevertheless 

 true, spring frosts are usually lighter within than they are outside this 

 shore-belt. 



These several advantages from the proximity of a considerable 

 body of water are well understood. There is another, however, that 

 may be of some value. During the heated term of summer there is 

 always a cool breeze from the water which modifies the temperature of 

 the hottest part of the day along this otherwise favored border of shore- 

 land, and may act beneficially in various w T ays : first, by promoting 

 a more active circulation of air among the leaves and young branches, 

 thereby favoring the healthy action of the organic surfaces hence, 

 greater immunity from blight and mildew in this region ; secondly, by 

 affording protection against the injuiy to which growing fruit is liable 

 from excessive heat ; thirdly, by maintaining a greater uniformity of 

 heat between night and day. The experiments of Koppen have shown 



