Sixteen Yea-es' Experience in Fruit Culture. 37 



• 



Aess where affinity is lacking. Thousands of dollars had been 

 spent in experimenting with crab roots, but the results had, 

 as far as he had learned, been far from satisfactory. Mr. 

 Wilcox's experiment may have been an exception ; he hoped it 

 "was, but, if so, it was not sufficient to warrant our recommending 

 the system to others. He could speak from experience in this 

 matter, for when so much was said in its favor he had been led to 

 hopp there was something in it, and he put out forty thousand grafts 

 on crab roots one season. They grew well at first, but did not 

 prove satisfactory. Out of the forty thousand he did not sell five 

 thousand, and was sorry he sold that many. Most of them went 

 on to the brush pile. He had but one single specimen of the lot 

 left, a Red Astrachan, an awkward, ungainly tree, branching out 

 at the surface of the ground, and doubtless was now standing on 

 its own roots. 



Mr. Partridge said that there were many trees that appeared to 

 be healthy scattered throughout the county, but they do- not bear, 

 or very scantily. The orchards that do the best, in fact all the 

 healthy trees, are on the tops or the north sides of the ridges, 

 what are called limestone ridges. 



Mr. Stickney inquired if the Siberians were all affected alike 

 by the blight. There are some varieties that are very much sub- 

 ject to blight, and others that are not. The Orange crab is one 

 of the latter kind. It is equal in quality to the Transcendent, 

 also in productiveness and hardiness, and is free, or nearly so, 

 from attacks of blight. He thought the people in the northern 

 part of the state would find it a treasure on this account. 



Mr. Partridge replied that the Transcendent blighted the worst, 

 and the Ilyslop the next,- perhaps. Whitney's No. 20 was affected 

 least, but yet it suffered some. 



Mr. Harris said many had labored hard and long to find some 

 way by which to raise apples successfully. He had for many 

 years spent all he could get for this purpose ; had tried all the 

 varieties recommended by the Pomological Society, and by our 

 state societies ; had tried crab roots and seedling-', and all sys- 

 tems of culture, denying himself and his family of many things 

 they would have liked and ought to have had. The losses and 



