STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 61 



From all I could see the orchards of Pike County were in far 

 more than average condition. But with the canker worm so well 

 established they will have to wage an energetic war or retrograde. 

 Saw from the cars on the Illinois river bottom, apple trees twelve to 

 fifteen inches through, appearing perfectly healthy and think from 

 the shape of the trees that they were Rome Beauty. This was sandy 

 second bottom. 



Returning to Bluffs we passed to Jacksonville, in Morgan 

 County, and called on A.. L. Hay. From him we learned that canker 

 worm had completely defoliated some orchards, and it is a question 

 if a person ought to be allowed to let them remain and multiply, 

 even in their own orchards. Morning of 24th called on our friend 

 J. Heinl, and learned that plums had been partially destroyed by 

 frost, but otherwise a flattering prospect for a good fruit crop. 



Wheat was looking very promising within the whole valley of the 

 Illinois river, as far as we could see from the cars as we traversed it 

 going to and fro, but have since learned that the crop was not as 

 then seemed probable. 



This was the only trip taken by me during the season as a purely 

 horticultural one. But on a trip in June, to Rock Island, passing up 

 the Mississippi bottoms, most of the way (viz., just under the bluffs), 

 I noticed a marked difference from the condition of the trees on Illi- 

 nois bottom, apparently similarly situated, scarcely a healthy tree to 

 be seen. And on the return through Rock Island, Henry, and a 

 small portion of Mercer and Knox counties, scarcely a healthy tree 

 was to be seen. In Warren county the condition began to improve, 

 and it and McDonough showed some trees looking fairly well, 

 although not strictly healthy. 



During several trips through Adams, Brown and Hancock coun- 

 ties, I have observed abundant crops of apples. But many of the 

 trees exhausted all their vitality to mature the crop and the apples 

 not as large as usual, while trees that were unable to mature their 

 crop was not an unusual thing. Pears and Plums gave a good crop 

 where the fruit was uninjured in the spring. Small fruits (except 

 cherries) were generally as good as could have been expected consid- 

 ering the feeble and scattered condition of the vines, etc., from the 

 excessive drouth of the previous season. 



Young orchards where well cared for are looking reasonably well 

 and in all of my observations I have scarcely seen a case of blight on 

 either apple or pear, and in our own planting in orchards of about a 

 hundred pear trees in the last two years, I do not know that we have 

 lost a tree. Peach trees have not suffered as much as formerly. 



Small fruit suffered much by drouth during 1887. 



