432 ■ ANNUAL REPORT OF THE Off. Doc. 



CHERRIES AND PEARS. 



By Mr. C. K. Scoon, Geneva, N. Y. 



Mr. Chairman, Ladies and Gentlemen — I realized yesterday 

 right away that Mr. Wilson had a great advantage over me in his 

 subject and I began to think that I had rather an uphill task. I 

 just want to tell you, rather in an offhand way, of my experience, 

 and if any of you ever want to grow cherries or pears you will have a 

 little of one man's experience, at least my experience in cherries 

 There are two main varieties of sour cherries, the white juice cherry 

 and the dark juice cherry. The Early Richmond cherry is not a 

 desirable variety at all. It is a small cherry, mostly pit and juice 

 and not much meat. With us it used to be considered a very dis 

 puted topic as to what is the proper stock to use and there are var 

 ious opinions. I was brought up to believe that Mazzard stock wai; 

 by far the best for sour cherries. It is almost impossible for the 

 nurserymen to secure good trees from Mazzard stock. They usu 

 ally prefer to graft on Mahaleb stock as they take better upon it 

 and the stocks are cheaper. 



About ten years ago, I planted one block of trees by them 

 selves, part of Mazzard stock and part of Mahaleb, and on my soil 

 the result was very marked. The Mahaleb bore earlier, but over 

 bore. The fruit was small and inferior. The tree did not made the 

 growth and lacked the hardiness of the Mazzard block. The dif 

 ference in these two blocks was very preceptible. Anybody going 

 along the road could see where one variety began and the other left 

 off. Mr. Willard tells me that will not hold true on all kinds of 

 soil. My soil is gravely loam. 



I am going to give you some reasons why I like to grow 

 sour cherries, and one reason is the beauty of the snowy blossoms 

 Unlike the apple, it blossoms before the leaves start. I go out into 

 my orchard and look up at the wealth of bloom. It is one of the 

 most beautiful sights you can imagine. Looking down along the 

 rows it seems like a mountain of snow, and I go right into the midst 

 of it and look up at the bees at their work and enjoy the delightful 

 perfume. A blind man could get to them if he had any nose. And 

 I say ''This is living." I pity the man who has to work inside of 

 brick walls. This is something that makes a man glad that he If 

 alive, and has the faculty to appreciate what nature has done for 

 him. 



Another reason for liking sour cherries is, because we rarely 

 miss a crop. This is not the case with peaches and plums. Very 

 frequently we have hopes of a big plum crop. The trees bloom pro- 

 fusely and everything looks favorable, and then there comes a spell 

 of cold weather and the bees do not work in the blossoms. The 

 small plums start to grow a little bit and w^e begin to run our bu^r 



