284 ILLINOIS STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



decline of orchards from which crop after crop of cereals or grasses has been 

 taken, and in the revival of the trees, the renewing of their youth, which 

 takes place when the soil of such orchards is thoroughly pulverized and 

 well manured. I have witnessed these declines and transformations — re- 

 juvenations — in numerous instances. 



Second — We must adapt the form of our trees to the requirements of 

 our climate. 



I am aware that the old story of high heads versus low heads is about 

 worn out, with its thousand repetitions, both \)xo and con ; yet the expe- 

 riences of the best orchardists fully establish the fact that apple trees, with 

 branches so arranged as to shade their trunks and the ground over their 

 large roots, are the healthiest trees to be found in the State ; and while it 

 is annoying sometimes to be unable to drive the team close up to the 

 trees in plowing, or the wagon under the larger branches when gathering 

 the fruit, these annoyances are more than compensated for in the healthy 

 appearance of the trunks and larger limbs of the trees, and in luxuriant 

 foliage, which, after having done its work in building up the structure of 

 the tree, and elaborating nutritious juices which have been stored up in 

 bud and germ for the next year's growth and fruiting, fall to the ground, 

 and lie as a slight mulch upon the surface, to hold moisture and to pre- 

 vent the too deep freezing of the soil, instead of being blown away and 

 piled in heaps, leaving the ground naked beneath the trees, as is the case 

 with trees of the " Shanghai " or long-stem kind. 



Having traveled to the extent of at least twenty thousand miles in 

 this State, within the last twenty years, and generally with a view to exam- 

 ining the conditions of fruit plantations, I speak from personal observa- 

 tions of orchards in all situations, and of all forms of trees, when I say that 

 I do not believe that one apple tree in ten, in the north half of the State, 

 upon whose tall trunk the sun shines throughout the year, is not diseased 

 upon the south-west side of its trunk ; while with trees whose trunks are 

 shaded by the low branching limbs, diseased bodies are the exception and 

 not the rule. Again, the fruit is not as liable to be blown off from the 

 low trees, and what does fall is not as badly bruised. 



No one who has kept his eyes open has found any difference in fruit- 

 fulness for a series of years in favor of the tall trees — the only exception 

 in productiveness in favor of this form of tree being instances of badly 

 diseased trees, which have exerted all their energies to propagate their 

 species as largely as possible before their exit from tree-life. 



This provision of nature for the continuation of the existence of spe- 

 cies has deceived many an orchardist into the opinion that these really 

 death throes of his trees were indications of a healthy condition ; for why 

 would they bear such crops, and perhaps for two or three consecutive 

 years, if they were seriously diseased ? I apprehend a large part of the 

 testimony which has been given in favor of the productiveness of tall- 

 bodied trees, in Northern Illinois, has been given from such data at this ; 

 whereas the same witnesses, a few years later, would undoubtedly testify 

 that the "hard winter," or " the rascally borers," or "bark lice had de- 

 stroyed their best, most prolific trees." 



