PROCEEDINGS OF THE WINTER MEETING. 33 



conditions, a profitable crop is assured nearly every year. Furthermore, 

 we can continue to cultivate and grow, with any reasonable success, but a 

 very few of the old and once famous varieties. I wish to ask my fellow- 

 fruitgrowers, where are now the majority of our choice and promising 

 varieties of apple, pear, raspberry, strawberry, etc., which were cultivated 

 with profit and great success forty years ago? Truly can we say, they are 

 not grown at present, because, in most cases, they are no more considered 

 reliable varieties. So they have passed out of date, almost to be forgotten 

 by the practical apple-grower of today. 



It has been proven without a doubt that many of the cereals and vegeta- 

 bles do degenerate and become unproductive and of inferior quality. 

 In other words, the old varieties are mentioned as having run out. While 

 this has become an acknowledged fact in our agriculture, the same con- 

 ditions exist in horticultural affairs. Especially is this the case with 

 small fruits cultivated at the present day. Therefore, if the idea of 

 degeneration of all fruits holds good with the apple, why not profit thereby 

 to practice improved methods in cultivation, to seek after the few old 

 standard varieties which are reliable and those of the new varieties which 

 have proved to bear successful crops of fruit at the present day? 



There are but a very few of the old standard sorts for market which will 

 still bear heavy crops of choice fruit. The most promising variety with 

 us in Oceana county, during the past two seasons, is the Northern Spy. 

 This most excellent variety has produced double the quantity of No. 1 

 fruit of any other variety, for the number of trees in full bearing. It has 

 done remarkably well in Oceana county, and perhaps nearly all over 

 western Michigan. Nearly all the old and standard varieties of apple 

 have suffered to a greater extent with the fungus or so-called apple-tree 

 blight. The trees and orchards as a whole, during the last two years, have 

 iDeen much injured by this fungus, both in the lack of heavy foliage, 

 growth of young wood, and failure to produce sufficient fruit buds to 

 insure a crop, while nearly all varieties suffer more or less from the 

 effects of blight. It also is a noticeable fact that the orchards which 

 receive good and constant cultivation recover much sooner in vigor of 

 growth than those which do not have the proper cultivation. The best 

 and most reliable mode of cultivation for the bearing apple orchard, with 

 us in Oceana county, is to give the orchard constant cultivation until it 

 comes into bearing condition, then to seed down to clover and let this 

 grow and remain two years. If you think you can afford to do so, let the 

 crop of clover go back into the ground, and at the end of two years plow 

 under the sod. Give thorough cultivation for three years, followed again 

 by seeding to clover and plowing as before. We also are in need of some 

 way to exterminate the codlin moth, and this I firmly believe lies in 

 spraying, if done at the right time and with thoroughness. What we 

 need as fruitgrowers is more practice, the getting of the process of spray- 

 ing down to thoroughness. It certainly has proved very beneficial here 

 when the proper test has been given. 



The Ben Davis has shown large crops of fine-appearing fruit in some 

 of the off years, but does not nearly equal the Northern Spy in value. The 

 Baldwin, too, as a fair bearer of fruit, has met with some favor, but its 

 fruit is so very wormy and foliage so liable to the blight, it is not consid- 

 ered of much value with us. As to the best and most reliable fall apples, 

 the Oldenburg takes the lead of all varieties, producing'^large and abund- 

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