524 Report of the Department of Horticulture of the 



be sprayed, harvested and pruned with sufficient ease to make 

 fruit-growing profitable, proper cultivation may be made an efficient 

 means of lessening the washing of land. Whatever contributes to 

 the porosity of the soil prevents washing. It is obvious that cultiva- 

 tion makes a soil granular and porous. Plowing and tillage to check 

 surface wash on steep slopes should be as deep as possible; furrows 

 should run at right angles to the slope to impede the fall of the water; 

 in some cases open furrows and ditches having a very gentle fall 

 can well be maintained. If the above means of stopping surface 

 wash be supplemented by cover-crops, which check the wash at 

 the season when the rainfall is heaviest, it can be said that almost 

 any land upon which it is practicable to grow fruit can be cultivated. 

 Such deep-rooting cover-crops as the clovers and cow-horn turnips 

 are of great value on land that washes because they form root tubes 

 which help to take care of the water. Artificial drainage is some- 

 times necessary on hillsides to prevent land from becoming water- 

 logged which of course would favor washing. There need be little 

 solicitude about surface wash on most of the fruit lands of New York 

 if proper precautions are observed where it is menacing." 



cost of the two methods. 



Of the tests to determine the value of methods in commercial 

 fruit-growing, the cap sheaf of the shock should be the cost of pro- 

 duction. The curt dictum " the weakest goes to the wall " applies 

 in apple-growing as well as to other financial enterprises. But 

 unfortunately when we came to apply this test to the two methods 

 under comparison, expectant as we have been, the data are most 

 disappointing. The extremes are so far apart, not only between 

 the two treatments, but between the different plats under the same 

 treatment, that the figures are at once seen to mean but little. Let 

 us run over the summaries as found in Table IV, the amounts being 

 those charged the Station for the work by Mr. Hitchings. 



A glance at the acre averages shows that it has cost the Station 

 $.60 per acre annually to have the grass cut in Plat A and Plat B and 

 $.96 for the same work in Plat C. The cost of cultivation per acre 

 per year was $11.22 for A; $13.30 for B; and $24.33 for C. The 

 average for the sod plats is $.72 per acre; for the tilled ones $16.28 

 per year. We can well believe that grass can be cut for $.72 per 

 acre and that the average, though a little low, might pass for the 



