98 STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



lug, carrying and keeping qualities. I would not recommend the rais- 

 ing of a great many varieties, and it is always .important to plant 

 only the varieties suited to your soil and climatic conditions. 



The man who raises any kind of fruit on a car-lot basis, in our opinion, 

 has a distinct advantage over the man who, perhaps raises more fruit 

 but who can not load solid cars of one variety. 



Tlie question of fertilizer for our orchards is a most vital one. The 

 man who depends wholly on commercial fertilizers for his orchards, or 

 any other part of his farm for that matter, is making a very serious 

 mistake. 



If T could get all the good barnyard manure and all the good cover 

 crops I need, T would not buy a ponnd of commercial fertilizer, with 

 the exception of nitrate of soda as a top-dressing for pastures, meadows, 

 and wheat in the spring. 



With the right kind of cover crop to plow under and proper cultiva- 

 tion afterwards you will need mighty little else and you may have 

 to eliminate the cover crop occasionally. 



T am not advocating barnyard manure for peaches. 



A fruit-grower should walk through his orchards at least once every 

 week through the summer, and be on the lookout constantly for the 

 various diseases and ills that the tree is heir to. 



In the case of peaches the "grubbing" of the trees is one of the most 

 essential things, and should be done thoroughly at least once each year 

 — in May or June. The "grubs" must be removed or they will ruin 

 the trees in short order. Every diseased peach tree should be pulled 

 up and burned the moment it is discovered ; don't try to save part of 

 the tree which does not seem to be affected, as disease, after it once 

 appears, will spread very rapidly, and the entire tree will usually be 

 affected before the fruit can be harvested. 



There ought to be a strict law and a rigid enforcement of it, to pro- 

 tect the fruit-groAver from his careless neighbor. The man who will 

 not properly look after these things is a menace to his entire neighbor- 

 hood and should be forced to do so or be severely punished by the 

 State. 



Tf this wretched European war ever ends and the people over there 

 have any money left with which to buy fruit, T believe that the Elberta 

 peach can be exported with success, if picked at the proper time, pre- 

 cooled and quickly delivered to the ship under proper refrigeration. 



The experiment has been tried by western growers, with not very 

 satisfactory results, it is true, but the eastern orchards have several 

 days advantage, particularly those within five hundred miles of the 

 seaboard. 



The experiment has also been tried by Canadian growers under the 

 supervision of the Canadian Department of Agriculture, with very 

 much better results. 



The principal obstacle in the way of doing this thing successfully, 

 is the absence of railroad tracks on the New York docks, which would 

 permit r-ars to be switched direct to the side of the steamer and a quick 

 transfer of fruit to the steamer's refrigerators. 



