Fruits and Culture. 365 



work, so as to make it a success. All varieties of trees are not well 

 adapted to the same soil or location. All winter-keeping varieties 

 of apples, for instance, need a mois.ter soil and a cooler location than 

 the summer or early fall varieties. 



Now, many persons are not aware how much depends oa the 

 way trees are planted. It is not. unusual to see men plant trees very 

 much as they do a cabbage plant, making a hole in the ground just 

 about large enough to take in the roots, without straightening them 

 out or placing them so as to make the tree strong when it has grown 

 up and come to fruit-bearing. Three years since, one of my best- 

 appearing Baldwin trees was blown over by a heavy wind, and when 

 I came to examine the cause of it, I found that all the large roots were 

 en one side of the tree, proving very clearly that when it was planted 

 the large roots were not equally spread out, so as to support the tree 

 on all its sides. The tree had grown to about a foot in diameter, 

 with scarcely any wind protection on one side. 



One person alone cannot very well plant a tree, for some one 

 should hold the tree in place while the more experienced person places 

 ■the roots and fills in around them the fine loam. No manure or fer- 

 tilizer of any kind should ever be used around the roots when planted. 

 If trees are properly planted, they should make some growth the first 

 year ; but they will not do so if the hole dug is so small that the roots 

 cannot be properly placed, and find some soft, fine loam to feed upon. 

 Then the holes should be dug deeper at the outer edge than in the 

 center, so that in placing the roots, the ends will point down ward 

 rather than upward. When trees are properly planted, the land can 

 be cultivated with the plow or harrow without disturbing the roots, 

 and the trees will make a much more rapid growth than if planted 

 in ground not cultivated. 



A friend of mine at Sandwich, N. H., about twenty years ago 

 planted an orchard of about fifty Baldwin trees. He cultivated the 

 land for a few years, and then seeded it down to grass. The same 

 year, one of my friend's neighbors planted a much larger orchard, of 

 one thousand trees — five hundred of Baldwin and five hundred of Tal- 

 nian Sweets ; but he did not cultivate the land, and the trees made a 

 very slow growth, and many of them were killed by the borers. Two 

 years ago, my friend wrote me that he had more good fruit on his 

 small orchard of fifty trees than his neighbor had on his much larger 

 orcnard of nearly twenty times the size. 



Now, if there is any truth in the adage that "as the twig is bent, 

 the tree's inclined," then there is equal or more truth in the statement 

 that on the way the tree is planted, cared for and pruned for the first 



