STATE POMOLOGICAL SOCIETY. II5 



little about the work that was actually carried on on the place, 

 although the old farm was still my home. I was not there 

 during the day time, simply at night. Things went on in this 

 way until the fall of 1906, when my father, who was growing 

 old and feeble, requested me to take the place and carry it on 

 to suit myself. This I consented to do, disposed of my other 

 business, and took the place. 



About the first work that was attended to was the harvesting 

 of the apples. I remember way back in 1896, I think it was, 

 my father harvested something like 1200 barrels of apples. 

 People thought it was a large crop. But they were very poor 

 apples, small and green, and he sold them and realized ninety- 

 six cents a barrel at the station. That was a year of tremendous 

 crops in apples. From that time on he declared that he would 

 have nothing more to do with fruit, and paid no attention what- 

 ever to his trees, — simply had the fruit picked when the time 

 came. In harvesting the apples in 1906 there were about 300 

 barrels that were in fairly good condition to sell as mixed ap- 

 ples. In picking those apples I found a good many trees the 

 fruit on which was completely covered with San Jose scale, so 

 that I had to shake the apples off and put them into cider; I 

 found other trees that showed more or less scale on the fruit. 

 While picking the fruit I did not know what the trouble was, 

 but my son, who was then a student in the New Hampshire 

 College taking the agricultural course, was at home for a vaca- 

 tion over Sunday and I brought his attention to the condition of 

 the apples we were picking, and the condition of the trees in 

 some cases. After examining them, he said he thought it was 

 the San Jose scale, although he wasn't sure ; that they had been 

 studying that at the school, but hadn't had samples while he had 

 been there, so he could not tell exactly how it looked. He took 

 some of the apples and the twigs that were the worst affected 

 back with him to the college, and I soon learned that I had the 

 San Jose scale in bad shape. I realized what I had got for I 

 had read about the insect and knew something of what it would 

 do and the condition in which it would leave the trees if not 

 taken care of — that they would soon die — and I made up my 

 mind that I had got more on my hands than I could handle and 

 about decided to dig those trees out, — the worst of them, at any 



