112 AC.KICULTIRK Ol- MAINE. 



Another point that was considered in the general appearance 

 was space. We beheved it was of the utmost importance that 

 trees be given enough room in the orchard. That is, a Baldwin 

 tree should be scored off if it was set 25 feet each way, and a 

 Spy tree should be figured in much the same way, and we estab- 

 lished a standard, covering the different varieties. Ben Davis 

 and Wealthies and varieties of that type, of course, could be 

 much nearer together. That was given a basis of 75 points. 

 Then we figured a little bit on alignment, not very much, 25 

 points on a 1000 basis. 



After the general appearance, we put in the score card what 

 we term condition, and under that we had freedom from me- 

 chanical injury, such as scars from lack of care in pruning, or 

 running over it with a harrow or plow or some instrument 

 used in the orchard work; freedom from insect injury, which 

 of course included all insect injury; freedom from disease 

 injury; and maturity of the wood. We beheved we were justi- 

 fied in putting in a score for maturity of the wood, inasmuch 

 as winter-killing depends almost entirely upon it. That was 

 judged purely by the appearance of the foliage, by the condi- 

 tion of the outer twigs, and by the cultural methods that were 

 being carried on ; that is, whether or not there was anything 

 being done to check the growth of the tree. 



Under pruning we had some difficulty. It seemed quite a job 

 to get pruning in and give it the right balance to the rest of the 

 score card. W^e finally adjusted it by giving correct cutting a 

 score of 150 points and in scoring correct cutting we considered 

 training the tree and pruning the tree. It is pretty hard to 

 tell where pruning begins and where training leaves off. But 

 we did not feel that a tree that was not trained properly so as 

 to have a strong framework for holding up the fruit should be 

 given full credit, even providing it had been thinned out pretty 

 well. 



Then the last item was cost and, inasmuch as our figures 

 were of not very much value — at least as there had been years 

 when it had been almost impossible to get any — we considered 

 the best thing to do was to give it a very small count and per- 

 haps give every man perfect. This report will come in bulletin 

 form very shortly for the benefit of the men that are going 

 into the contest the next time, and we have included in the 



