286 TRANSACTIONS OF THE HORTICULTURAL 



upon the prairies of Illinois. Fruit has been grown here and 

 can be again. Many promising varieties hav^e been found want- 

 ing, while the most expensive have often proven the most worth- 

 less. Our methods of culture, or rather non-culture, have done 

 more injury than good, and our selection of orchard sites has 

 often caused a failure. But we must not give up. 



What would have been the results had the capitalists and 

 citizens of Chicago said after the great fire, "There is no use to 

 rebuild, another fire may come and burn us out again." 



Instead, they builded again, laying the foundations broader, 

 deeper and more substantial than before, and on them erected a 

 city ten times more beautiful, useful and valuable than the old 

 wooden structures of the past. To-day these blocks of stone 

 and granite stand as fitting monuments to the enterprise and sa- 

 gacity of the people of that great city. 



Our orchards, like the old wooden buildings of Chicago, a 

 heterogeneous mass and tangle of good, bad and indifferent va- 

 rieties, have met with disaster as destructive to them as the fire of 

 Chicago was to the wooden buildings of that city. Does it not 

 behoove us by energy, careful selection and good culture, to 

 replace the orchards of Illinois in such a manner that they shall 

 stand living monuments to our judgment and common sense? 



How we are to do this is the question which now confronts us 

 as individuals and as members of this Society. There are many 

 questions to be settled and many errors to be avoided. There 

 are those who, havingsome pet theory, endeavor to convince the 

 public that their way is the highway to success. Budded apple 

 trees and Hardy Russians have their exponents — the tree peddler 

 becomes the missionary and the farmer the ready victim. 



Let us leave experiments to those who can afford to make 

 them, or if we undertake a new thing let us be sure our facts are 

 in accord with the theory before we risk too much. 



The apple is the most important of the orchard fruits of this 

 section. The site for the orchard is the first thing to be settled. 

 One says plant them on the highest ground, another says plant 

 them on the low ground and you will succeed. I have seen good 

 orchards on both locations, and my observation has convinced 

 me that both may be right or wrong according as other con- 

 ditions are present or absent. Ground that will best resist sum- 

 mer drouth will insure the best orchard, and the cultivation and 

 care of the ground has much to do with this question. So select 

 good soil, prepare it in the best manner possible with the plow 

 and harrow, and then set your orchard trees at distances, two 

 rods apart each way. Fall plowing is best when it can be done. 

 When the ground is in good condition in the spring plant your 

 trees, never putting them in when it is muddy. 



I have fifty acres of young orchard, a part of which was set 

 four years ago. Some of the trees bore apples last season. 



