Winter Meeting. 259 



and we had a quarter of an inch of rain on the 4th of July, and a quarter 

 on the fifth, and we had no more rain then until the 15th of September. 



Mr. Speakman of Neosho, Mo. — We have no county society. We 

 have an association for the shipment of small fruits, which I think is in 

 very fair working order. The past season was fairly good for small 

 fruits. That is, for the strawberries ; the strawberries ■ with us brought 

 an average yield and the quality was surely better for the most part than 

 the ordinary season. The apple crop for the most part was quite good. 

 Some orchards that were cultivated properly, and I don't know that 

 any of them were cultivated properly, but those that received the best 

 treatment, and the most cultivation, the most spraying and attention gen- 

 erally yielded very good crops of good fruit, while the others as com- 

 pared with them, were failures. 



The peach crop was something immense. The biggest crop that 

 was ever known there. Now as to prospects I will say that we have 

 had more rain evidently than many of these localities from v/hich re- 

 ports come, and our trees are in good condition ; much better than the 

 average after a severe drouth, and we have prospects for more than a 

 • half a crop of fruit from our strawberries. 



Mr. Dix of Jefferson City, Mo. — In our county we had a good 

 crop of strawberries, and the other berries were a light crop. Where 

 it was cultivated we had a fine crop of tree fruit, and those that didn't 

 cultivate had hardly any. 



President Murray, Holt County. — We have no local society in ex- 

 istence now, but we are still raising fruit. There was no general crop 

 of apples. I will state in regard to strawberries they were good, but 

 there is no large quantity grown; there are no large growers in Holt 

 county. There are some small growers and they find a ready market 

 for what they grow at home. 



As for the blackberries and raspberries, they were a half crop. I 

 netted $200 from my blackberry patch, which was about a lialf crop. 

 The peaches were exceptionally fine, although we don't have large peach 

 orchards. We have some fine peach orchards, and the fruit sold readily 

 and at good prices bringing in from one to two hundred dollars an 

 acre net money. The apples were a failure to a large extent, although 

 there were some orchards that had a good many apples. The apples 

 sold from about $25 to $200 an acre. The trees that are over six years 

 old are in fine condition. We did not suffer as much from the drouth 

 as we did from the extreme heat, although we had a drouth. I think 

 the prospects for another year, generally speaking, are good, and the 

 fruit growers are of good heart, and we now feel more like taking an 

 interest in cultivating and caring for the orchards, I think, than we have 



