lOO AGRICULTURE OF MAINE. 



and in the largest Ben Davis planting the weeds were now al- 

 lowed to come up for the purposes of winter cover. 



During the season the trees were sprayed three times at the 

 proper intervals and periods : when the blossom buds showed 

 pink at the tips ; immediately after the petals fell ; and from ten 

 days to two weeks later. With the exception of some experi- 

 mental plots, where the sulphur sprays with lead arsenate were 

 used in comparison with bordeaux and with unsprayed trees, 

 bordeaux mixture was the fungicide used in all the orchards, 

 combined with lead arsenate for insect control. The results of 

 the spraying experiment, reported at your meeting last year, 

 need not be dwelt upon in detail at this time. 



We have said that all the orchards were put under the plow. 

 This is true if we except three plots of about i 1-4 acres each, 

 one of which was pastured to sheep, one to hogs, and the 

 third left in grass just as the Station found it. With the excep- 

 tion of these three plots and of two others of about equal area, 

 of which we shall speak presently, all orchards received high- 

 grade, chemical fertilizer at the rate of 1500 pounds per acre. 



Of the two other plots just referred to, one was treated with 

 eleven loads of stable manure, to be compared with its neighbor, 

 treated with a complete chemical fertilizer at the rate before 

 mentioned. The object of this was a study of purely organic 

 versus purely chemical fertilizer for apples. This experiment 

 is to run for a series of years and the results are not yet definite 

 enough to make deductions therefrom. 



The results of this year were evident. They were not 

 expressed in terms of a large crop but in marked evidence of 

 response to treatment, with good prospect of fniit production in 

 the near future. At this time one could determine with practical 

 certainty which of the trees were beyond hope of redemption at 

 any reasonable cost, and these were removed. In number they 

 totaled about 500, so that at present there are about 2500 trees 

 at Highmoor, although not all of them of size sufficient to bear 

 much fruit. 



The greater portion of the season's crop was picked from the 

 Ben Davis orchard, used for the specific experimental work. 

 The trees sprayed with the lime-sulphur preparations produced 

 excellent apples — large, well colored, free from parasitic injury, 

 with a fine gloss. Nearly all the fruit sprayed with bordeaux 



