STATE POMOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 79 



{-reason yet for changing the conclusions arrived at while seated on 

 that bowlder, and have acted accordingly. 



Knowing mice prefer oats to any other grain, I have supplied my 



mice each fall with the amount mv iudo:raent told me would be suffi- 



cient to winter them, and that is the principal protection I have given 



my orchard. My method is to carry oats into the orchard late in tlie 



fall, take a bailed basket lull on one arm and drop handfuls in the 



.hollows and along the edge of the wet land alluded to above, and 



where the snow drifts on. A little observation in spring has shown 



.me where the most mice winter and there I leave the most feed. I 



-have used tarred sheathing paper around trees to a limited extent, 



but if mice -are driven to the necessitv of living on the bark, thev 



'Will gnaw. the tree above the paper. A little observation during the 



summer and fall will determine whether there are few mice or manv, 



and I provide for them accordingly. When the mice are thick over 



winter I seldom see a pile of oats in spring not eaten. When there 



.are but few the}' are not eaten so clean. 



2sow for the result of my method of protecting trees from mice. 



I have now about seven hundred trees. I commenced settino- 



sevent'^en years ago and have set some every spring since I have 



, probably lost in the time one hundred trees (losing eighty- five fall 



planted at one time), so I have set out eight hundred trees. In ad- 



• dition to this. I have sowed two nurseries in the time and within the 

 limits of my crchard. The trees in the oldest one are all disposed 

 of, and nearly all in the other. All the trees I have lost by mice 

 in the orchard and nurseries in seventeen years can be numbered on 

 the fino;ers and thumbs of mv two hands. I think no one will 



■ doubt the efficiency of my method of protection, but the question 

 of expense may be raised, and in anticipation of such an event I 

 will answer in advance. It is not as expensive as paper or birch 

 bark. The extra time required in putting on the bark or paper in 

 the fall, and removing them in spring, will more than balance the 



• cost of oats above that of the bark or paper. 



Thousands of trees girdled by mice are given up as spoiled, that 

 could be saved b}' timely care. 



Visit the orchard often in early spring, and if trees are found 

 gnaw^ed, immediately apply mortar made of clay and horse manure, 

 .and wind with swoolen cloth. Trees with the bark removed to the 

 .wood, treated in this way, before they have been exposed to wind 

 ;.and sun long enough to sear the wood, nine times in ten, will form 

 ;.a. new bark »and coicae out. all right. 



