STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 149 



But by far the most important lesson we have to learn is in re- 

 gard to the depth and tilth of soils in which roots may develop. If 

 in a pasture the soil in one case is suitahle for an abundant growth 

 of roots only one foot deep, and in another case otherwise similar, 

 three feet deep, surely a difference will be perceptible during the dry 

 months of the season. There is justly much discussion about the 

 value or importance of deep and sliallow plowing in preparation for 

 a crop. Mechanical operations are not the only means by which 

 soils are fitted for root development. Under the same head comes 

 drainage, exposure to the frosts of winter, freedom from tramping, 

 etc., when the ground is wet, in part the rotation of cro])s; and last, 

 but not least, the application of fertilizers, even though these are 

 put upon the surface. But in Illinois, usually I cannot help but 

 think that once stirring and comminating the sub-soil to the great- 

 est practical depth must have for many years a beneficial effect. One 

 can tell by the way a sjiade sinks under the foot where a ditch had 

 been dug twenty years before. On a notable blue grass lawn, 

 familiar to the writer, an area is still easily traced ever}^ August, 

 where in 1870 an excavation about three feet deep, twenty by thirty 

 feet in extent of surface, was made and the dirt afterward moved 

 back again. The August grass is, sixteen years after, still greener 

 and fresher over this spot than upon the adjoining land upon every 

 side. Fineness of tilth certainly has a most marked effect, not only 

 upon the free and full growth of roots, but upon the continued sup- 

 ply of moisture so imperatively demanded by growing plants. 

 Thoroughly pulverized soil accumulates and preserves large amounts 

 of moisture in the best possible order for the needs of vegetation. 

 The observed favorable effects are in part due to other influences, 

 but the relition to moisture alone would clearly mark the import- 

 ance of good tillage. The effects of mulch and shade in the same 

 nuinner are worthy of the best attention and wisest study. Soil, 

 especially clays, in which water long stands, becomes compact and 

 tenaceous, quite unfit for root growth. Stagnant water itself is one 

 of the worst of injurious agents to agricultural plants. 



THE DEATH AND DECLINE OF ORCHAKDS. 

 BY PROF. G. H. FRENCH, CARBONDALE. 



At the meeting of the State Horticultural Society held in Cen- 

 tralia this subject was discussed considerably, the cold winters being 

 the general cause that was the supposed agent of the widespread de- 

 struction in the northern part of tlie State. At that meeting I ex- 

 pressed the opinion that I did iu)t believe severe cold was the only 

 cause of so many trees dying, as in (jther States where the cold was 

 more severe than ever in Central and Northern Illinois trees lived to 

 be fifty to seventy.-tive years old, and retained their wonted vigor. 



