f-i Wisconsin State Horticultural Society. 



OBSERVATION REPORTS. 



At our last annual meeting the number of observation 

 districts was increased from nine to fourteen. Printed 

 blanks for reports have been distributed to the members of 

 the committee on observation. The result has been more 

 and better reports. This portion of our work is of vital im- 

 portance. If the number of districts could be increased so 

 that each county should be an independent district, repre- 

 sented upon the committee by a live man or woman, our 

 published reports would have ten times the practical value 

 they now have. The report of a year upon Russian apples 

 for instance, from three or ten persons in as many localities, 

 cannot be compared with a record made up by fifty observ- 

 ers, scattered through all the counties of the state. Perhaps 

 the time has not come when the society can so enlarge its 

 work, but the matter is certainly worthy of serious consid- 

 eration. 



HORTICULTURE IN WISCONSIN. 



Jn the early part of last summer occurred the most severe 

 drouth ever known in the state. Frfiit trees had passed 

 through the winter in fair condition, and small fruits of all 

 kinds were never more promising than when the season 

 opened; strawberry beds were covered with white blankets 

 of blossoms in May, and a little while later the blackberry 

 rows, even when they had not been covered, blossomed un- 

 til they looked like long snowbanks dotted with green. 



The drouth took all of the poetry out of the situation and 

 most of the profits. Strawberries wilted, blackberries died 

 green on tht bushes, raspberries became so dry and seedy 

 that the birds would not eat them, and even apples were 

 dwarfed and prematurely ripened. Upon rich land thor- 

 oughly tilled and well drained, the effects above quoted 

 were hardly discernable. The drouth has taught many of 

 our Wisconsin fruit growers a lesson. It left them poorer 

 in pocket but richer in knowledge. Wisconsin cannot com- 

 pete with Michigan at the present time, in raising apples. 

 The state is dotted with dead orchards. The friends of the 



