220 TRANSACTIONS OF THE NORTHERN 



The pruning or shortening in maybe left until the growing season if 

 preferred. Great care should be used then in not allowing two branches 

 of nearly equal size to start out like your fuigcrs side by side, but 

 rather leave such as start like your ihi/mh, from the side. All side branches 

 should be removed so as ultimately to leave a straight single body four to 

 six feet high to give room to cultivate the ground and gather the fruit. All 

 small limbs should be removed from the inside of the tree, as it grows 

 from year to year, sufficiently to leave space for sun and air to mature 

 the fruit ; but I would never cut limbs of any size in the spring. 



The trees may receive a thorough washing with soft soap and water 

 (half and half) the last of May and August, also a good coat of white- 

 wash at the beginning of winter (applied hot) to keep off rabbits. I 

 think the whitewash would be as useful as the soap and water for the 

 three washings and have experimented largely, and cannot say which is 

 the best, both having given good satisfaction, but 1 regard the one or 

 the other indispensable to the growing a first class-tree. Either should 

 be applied as high up into the branches as possible, and I have found a 

 common shoe-brush fastened to a handle about two feet long to be the 

 cheapest and most rapid implement to do the work with. 



The ground under the trees should be kept mellow and thoroughly 

 clean and cultivated in sweet corn planted about the first to twelfth of 

 June. 



In no case should the ground be seeded or allowed to run into grass 

 sod, nor should grain of any kind be sowed there. 



The inevitable tendency of such treatment is to bring in bark-louse, 

 borers, etc., and induce want of care and watching which are indispens- 

 able to the successful orchardist. 



The ground should be kept in good order, and sufficiently rich to 

 keep up vigorous growth when the trees are in bearing, by spreading 

 good yard manure in the fall and cultivating it in, the next summer. 



My practice is to pile up the earth around the tree to a distance of 

 about three feet, some eight to ten inches deep, or if the soil needs man- 

 ure I pile that up — the object is to check the action of the frost, etc. 

 Late in the spring, say about the twentieth of May, this is removed and 

 a good thorough washing, as before spoken of, is applied. 



WHAT VARIETIES SHALL WE PLANT. 



This subject comes home with great force by the side of which such 

 questions as, who shall be our next President, or, is the Darwinian theory 

 correct, sink into insignificance. 



1 have near fifty varieties under cultivation that have been recom- 

 mended by this State Horticultural Society, and if I were to commence 

 now to set a commercial orchard, I would not use over fifteen at most. 



The Carolina Red June was so covered with scabs yearly that they 

 were worthless. 



White Winter Pearmain, same and did not bear much. 



Yellow Bellfioii.ier, no fruit. 



