170 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



for growing young plants of the quince and the Paradise apple 

 to be used as stocks for dwarf trees. 



Soil and Situation. Let us suppose the nursery work to be well 

 advanced and a suflScient number of young trees ready for removal 

 to the orchard; what then? Why, transplant them to be sure. 

 But let us inquire whether we be not rather fast, for this should 

 have been borne in mind for the past year or two, or for several 

 years, while the young trees were coming on, and a suitable place 

 selected and prepared to receive them. This cannot be done in a 

 day, although some act as if they thought so, but this does not make 

 it so, any more than because they also think that transplanting and 

 after culture consists in crowding the roots into a small hole and 

 covering them with the sods taken out, and thereafter letting 

 the tree alone to struggle for existence, makes that so. 



An orchard should be looked upon as a long investment, a crop 

 to be harvested during half a century, and deserving of proper 

 selection of place and preparation of it at the outset, and careful 

 treatment all the while it is bearing; just as really as a crop of 

 Indian corn deserves preparation of soil, manuring, hoeing and 

 care until the harvest is finished. 



The situation selected for an orchard should be good upland, 

 with a dry subsoil. Side hills and elevated, ridges often furnish the 

 best, especially for apple orchards, and sometimes even where 

 they are too rocky to admit of cultivation. These as well as other 

 uplands are sometimes wet and springy, in which case underdain- 

 ing is indispensable. Cold water is excellent in its place, but is 

 not good for the roots of fruit trees, and though they may struggle 

 along for a while, they can never thrive with wet feet the year 

 round. As a general rule, good corn laud is good orchard land, 

 but the rule is not without exceptions, for corn sometimes does 

 well on intervals where fruit trees would not be safe in winter. 



Next in importance to dryness of subsoil, I would rank the qual- 

 ity and character of the soil itself The apple will grow on a great 

 variety of soils but it likes best a deep gravelly strong loam, alike 

 removed from mere sand, gravel or clay, and if calcareous, all the 

 better. It should be good enough to yield from twenty-five to 

 thirty-five bushels of Indian corn to the acre. If not good enough 

 to do this, make it so, or try elsewhere ; unless it possesses some 

 peculiar excellencies for orchard use, aside from what would be 

 requisite for corn. 



The ground, if not too rocky to preclude its possibility, should 



