16« NEBRASKA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY 



perfect than Nebraska, Iowa, Kansas or Missouri fruits, will the slight 

 difference in appearance more than offset the additional expenses in- 

 cident to a two-thousand mile haul to market? The facts are, varieties 

 adapted to Nebraska conditions and given care, produce fruits that are 

 Tery satisfactory to the large majority of consumers. 



Grimes Golden and Jonathan apples, as grown in southeastern Ne- 

 braska, when properly graded, and suitably packed, command very 

 satisfactory prices even in competition with the famous fruits of New 

 York or Oregon. The chief points in fruit growing is adaptability of 

 Tarieties and care of plants. 



Forest Trees for Slope Lauds and Kiyer Bottoms. 



Prank J. Phillips, Professor of Forestry, University of Nebraska. 



It is not yet a generation since the demand for land began to in- 

 tensify over the United States as a whole. From single ranches which 

 stretched as far as the eye could see, thousands of homesteads have 

 been made. From the so-called deserts of the middle-west have arisen 

 powerful agricultural commonwealths, richer than many European na- 

 tions; from the days of the prospecting pioneer we have progressed to 

 the days of the developer. Land once went a-begging; now, it is being 

 searched for at prices far beyond the fondest dreams of our fathers and 

 the demand steadily increasing. Is is generally recognized that most 

 of our agricultural land is already in private holdings of moderate 

 size and the question now before the people is the one of best use. 



What to do with our slope and flood lands is a problem of great 

 importance. Our soil experts have found that it is a serious problem to 

 maintain soil fertility and soil moisture on many of the best level lands. 

 On slope lands the problem is a much more difficult one. Farmers 

 frequently find that the crops of their slopes are not paying for the 

 cultivated crops such lands will produce. Orchardists may secure fair 

 to good crops but are often confronted with soil washing. The graz- 

 ing expert and the forester find that forage grasses or forest trees are 

 usually the most satisfactory crops that can be grown on slopes on 

 slopes steeper than 15 to 25 degrees, according to slope and locality. 



Foreig^n Experience as a Guide. 



Many foreign countries have already had experience with such pro- 

 blems. Italy, Spain and Portugal have all suffered from terrible floods 

 which have largely resulted from the removal of forests on slope lands. 

 It has frequently been said that one whole province in Spain, once 

 pix)sperous, is now almost an entire desert as a result of removing slope 

 forests. In squthern France, favorable slopes are largely terraced 

 and used for grape culture. In China, many of the steeper slopes are 

 terraced for crop production, but the destruction of the forest has pro- 

 ceeded to such an extent that even such an exceptional treatment is 

 not productive of good resuts. In Switzerland and Germany, most of the 

 mountain regions are characterized by farms in the valleys, pasture 



