30 Director's Report of the 



under tillage or in sod. The experiment of which this bulletin is a 

 report was begun in 1903 in the orchard of W. D. Auchter near 

 Rochester, New York. This orchard is far more typical than the 

 Hitchings orchard of the apple-growing regions of New York, in both 

 soil and climate, and the results obtained have much wider adapta- 

 bility than those set forth in Bulletin No. 375. The conclusions 

 reached were that not only should apples not be grown in sod but 

 that for the best good of the trees there should be no sod near them. 

 Grass militates against apple-growing in sod in several ways which 

 act together, as: 



(1) Lowering the water supply. 



(2) Decreasing some elements in the food supply. 



(3) Reducing the amount of humus. 



(4) Lowering the temperature of the soil. 



(5) Diminishing the supply of air. 



(6) Affecting deleteriously the beneficial micro-flora. 



(7) Forming a toxic compound that affects the trees. 



Ten years' profits from an apple orchard. — Bulletin No. 376 shows 

 the outgo and the income from an apple orchard for a period of ten 

 years. The orchard was one of Baldwin apples, ten acres in area, 

 situated a few miles west of Rochester, known to many as the 

 Auchter orchard, in which the Geneva Experiment Station has 

 carried on a comparative test of sod mulch and tillage during the 

 last ten years. The average yield of the orchard for the ten years 

 was 79.2 barrels of barrelled stock per acre and 37.6 barrels of evapo- 

 rator and cider stock. The cost sheet for a barrel of apples was 

 as follows: 



Interest on investment SO . 21 



Taxes .012 



Tilling .063 



Pruning .03 



Spraying .096 



Cover crop .023 



Superintending orchard .25 



Picking, packing, sorting and hauling .244 



Barrel .36 



$1.29 



