246 TRANSACTIONS OF THE ILLi:^ OIS 



latitude. The country is as line a farming section as can be desired, nearly all the 

 lands being from rolling to fine swells and elevated ridges, with scattered hills of con- 

 siderable extent. This wheat and apple country, with Green Lake county for its 

 center, comprises, perhaps, from 900 to 1,000 sections, nine-tenths of which has good 

 natural drainage, with a strong infusion of available lime in by far the larger portion 

 of both its tine prairies and variable timber soils. 



In an orchard set by me on the north slope of a white oak ridge, in 1852, Fall Wine 

 bears well; fruit fair and good; tree a medium grower, and passably hardy. The Fall 

 Pippin, of Philadelphia, is doing finely. The tops of the trees are now fifteen feet 

 across. The tree seems to be hardier than when younger, and now produces paying 

 crops of fair-skinned and magnificent apples. The present owner, Henry Vine, prizes 

 this apple highly. Rhode Island Greening is also doing pretty well, yielding paying 

 crops of unblemished fruit since the trees recovered from the pinching winters of '56 

 and '57, and the more recent injury inflicted by millions of the cicadas in the summer 

 of 1863. The bark louse also inflicted a severe check to the same orchard from '6i to 

 '67, but now these oyster-shell sap-suckers are well nigh gone. ^Esopus Spitzenberg 

 does well as to tree; a medium grower, but hardy, while the apples are the very best 

 of the old winter varieties; but only a few of them. I shall suggest root-pruning to 

 induce fuller bearing, the tree being sufliciently hardy and vigorous in this climate. 

 The Northern Spy are the finest trees, and evidently the most hardy and rapid growers 

 in the orchard. But while large enough to produce two barrels, if fairly loaded, they 

 yielded only three or four bushels each in '69. Root-pruning is here again suggested as 

 a corrective. Three trees of Northern Spy, growing on an adjacent ridge, more fully 

 exposed to wind arid weather, bore five barrels to the tree last season; trees same age 

 as shyer bearers. There are other varieties of good apples that do well; and also 

 three varieties of pears that bear fair crops in this orchard. But time fails me. 



In another orchard northwest of my house, set out also in 1852, and very badly 

 managed for eight or ten years — a part of which is on too low ground, bringing the 

 roots too near a wet subsoil for the best health of the trees — the following facts are 

 established. American Golden Russet, of Barry— the branches interlock at twenty 

 feet between the trees; the tree is vigorous, hardy, and an annual bearer of moderate 

 crops of unblemished and first-quality fruit; and, 1 may add, this apple is very much 

 grown in this district of country for long keeping. About thirty Yellow Bellefleur 

 trees — more than half of them vigorous and healthy, and their heads interlocking at 

 twenty feet — sujjply from forty to seventy bushels per year; about half the years 

 bearing well, and then lightly, alternate years. This is a popular and profitable apple 

 hereabouts ; and a man, who is a good judge of apples, planted out si.x; or seven hun- 

 dred of them in a young orchard, three year ago, a couple of miles distant. 



In our orchard, setting of 1852, Spitzenberg is a healthy tree, full in the middle, but 

 quite a shy bearer. I will trv root-pruning in spring with it. Nevvtown Pippin 

 exhibits the same medium rate of growth and fair hardiness as Spitzenberg, but is 

 much more productive, only a little spotted. Several trees of Rhode Island Greening, 

 that seem to have taken on a new life since the terrible visitation of cicadas in 1863, 

 bear abundantly of perfect, large apples. I find there are also a number of bearing- 

 Greening trees in other orchards within a few miles. Westfield Seek-no-further is a 

 vigorous tree, and in several years has yielded full crops of fair, unblemished Iruit, not 

 nearly as salable as Bellefleur, from not being near so good a cooking apple. Bark 



