REPORT OF STATE HORTICULTURIST. 6l 



We are getting ten or fifteen dollars' worth of nitrogen by 

 sowing the vetches, and getting the humus as well. To grow 

 buckwheat or timothy hay or oats on our orchards would be to 

 take the nitrogen out of the soil, whereas vetches and clover 

 and all the plants that belong to the leguminous clas^s are nitro- 

 gen collectors. That is the reason I can grow luxuriant trees, 

 that is the reason I can grow good crops of apples, because I 

 am procuring the nitrogen from the air, and it is the most ex- 

 pensive fertilizer we have. No good orchardist in the Annapolis 

 valley would think of such a thing as to grow an orchard 

 without growing a cover crop, and a cover crop of the right 

 kind. The man who sows buckwheat is making a mistake. 

 He gets some humus but he has lost the nitrogen. You may get 

 bigger clover crops, but I get a better crop with the vetches. 



Ques. What time do you sow the vetch ? 



Ans. About the 25th of June ; not later than the first of July 

 anyway. The reason I would not sow it earlier is that I want 

 to keep up the cultivation while the growing season is on and 

 conserve the moisture. About the first of July you want the 

 trees to stop growing and want the fruit buds to form and 

 ripen. An excessive groA\i:h late in the season is sure to result 

 in winter-killing. The nurseryman who forces his trees to grow 

 up to the first of November will find that they will be winter- 

 killed if there is a severe winter. 



Ques. What kind of vetch do you use? 



Ans. It is the summer vetch or tare that costs $2.00 a bushel. 

 We have always found that when we have enough fertilizers in 

 our orchards vetches will grow luxuriantly. If you have an 

 abundance of potash and phosphoric acid in your land, then the 

 addition of nitrogen gives you the full results. If you haven't 

 enough phosphoric acid, then phosphoric acid would be the 

 factor needed. Generally speaking, when you get an orchard 

 into a good state of fertility, with enough plant food, there will 

 be no trouble about the vetches. It may be that the bacteria for 

 the vetches is not in your soil. You had better buy a bushel of 

 vetch seed and with it you will get a little bottle of bacteria 

 peculiar to that seed. W'et the vetch seed with it, and it will 

 grow finely. The same is true with clover. 



Ques. Why do you use the summer vetch instead of the win- 

 ter vetch? 



