48 STATE POMOLOGICAL SOCIETY, 



that they did not get too intimate. Don't overstock if you put 

 hogs in your orchard and be sure to glance over the trees 

 daily. If any tree is receiving too much attention call the hogs 

 away by scattering a little corn in some spot neglected. 



Two years have told the story. That portion of the orchard 

 occupied by the hogs has made great growth of fresh wood, 

 given an abundance of rich, deep, strong leaves and best of all 

 a large crop of fruit free from the railroad worm and practically 

 so from other insect pests. Those trees where the horse manure 

 was spread produced big crops but not free and smooth as 

 where the hogs had cleaned up the apples that dropped, while 

 those in grass, where the Fisher fertilizer was applied, gave 

 only a moderate increase of fruit. Experience has satisfied me 

 the quickest and cheapest way to free our orchards from wormy 

 apples is by hogs or sheep, quickest because every afifected apple 

 that drops is eagerly eaten, and cheapest because the devouring 

 of this infested fruit, and the fertilizing of the land, sure to fol- 

 low, will radically improve the size, yield and quality of the 

 fruit. Here the result of companionship may be seen and it was 

 a valuable object lesson to me. The trouble is we set our trees 

 and then expect them to go alone. For one I love the company 

 of an apple tree, to get out in the twilight of summer evenings 

 and talk to them as though they were human, to look them over 

 as one would a friend, to watch and see if there's any injury 

 being inflicted or any limbs broken, to enter into partnership 

 for business and pleasure and get solid satisfaction watching 

 conditions improve year by year. The closer the affinity be- 

 tween the man and the tree the more probable that the tree 

 ^\ ill get good treatment — right treatment, so that it can respond 

 in fruit. I take it that the reason why we do not get more or 

 better fruit from our trees is that we fail to appreciate the recip- 

 rocal relations which must exist for the best to be possible. Go 

 among your trees frequently, talk to them earnestly, listen to the 

 story they have to tell, learn their wants and supply their neces- 

 sities and by so doing find profit and satisfaction. I pity the 

 man who cannot find time or inclination to go among his trees 

 and enter into close companionship, who thinks this nothing but 

 fancy, a play of the imagination. Trees talk as well as breathe 

 and their language is clean, sweet, helpful and inspiring to him 

 who seeks to know their moods and answer their necessities. 



