466 STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



other varieties; flowers small. You can tell them by the flower; think they have always 

 fruited after a certain length of time; slow growers; tender and liable to injury in 

 winter. 



Mr. Root: Is there any benefit in setting other varieties near them? 



Mr. Hooker: I think very little fruit is lost from want of fertilization. I think the 

 German prune the last to flower. 



Mr. LuTTs: I kept a record last season of about fifty or sixty varieties and found 

 that the German prune was the last to blossom; think it fertilized itself. The first 

 ten or twelve years they did not set the blossoms. 



Mr. Atwood: Are not many of the German Prunes that are in bearing in the neigh- 

 borhood of Rochester raised from seed? 



Mr. Wentz: Yes; and about two miles north of the city there are some two hundred 

 farmers who have raised these fruits from sprouts; but the fruit is smaller than those 

 we propagated. 



Mr. LuTTs: Do the seedlings come into bearing any sooner than if taken from the 

 nursery rows? 



Mr. Wentz: In about five or six years. 



QUESTIONS AND DISCUSSIONS. 



WJuit is the cause {process) of injury to the roots of dormant trees under the action 

 of freezing and thaiving, and u-hat is the best method of dratcing the frost out of 

 frozen roots? 



Mr. C. M. Hooker: I do not know the cause. We found that trees which had been 

 frozen experienced no injury when the frost was drawn out slowly by placing them in 

 earth out of doors or in cellars. When the frost was taken out rapidly in the atmos- 

 phere or by the application of water the trees were entirely destroyed. A good many 

 years ago a load of our apple trees, on a tree rack, left in a barn over night, were 

 frozen. The foreman applied cold water to the roots, thinking it would be a nice way 

 to take out the frost. The result was that every tree, the roots of which were touched 

 by the water, was killed. Those which he placed in the earth came out in perfect con- 

 dition. So that it is not so much the actual freezing which causes the injury as it is 

 the manner in which the frost is extracted from the roots. 



Mr. J. F. White asked if Mr. Hooker examined the roots of the trees to see if the 

 water that was applied had cracked the bark of the roots ? 



Mr. Hooker: Where the water touched the roots they turned red, as if scalded. 



Mr. White : In my experience I believe damage resulted from the fact that the 

 water applied entered the cracks in the bark of the roots. 



Mr. T. S. Hubbard : The great secret is to keep frozen stock from exposure to the air. 



Mr. Wing R. Smith : If the trees had been submerged in water would not that have 

 had the same efl'ect as burying in earth ? 



Mr. Hooker : The water was simply thrown on. The trees which were saved were 

 all heeled in alike. 



Mr. M. B. Waite said, freezing concentrated the water in crystals, and thawing 

 suddenly released the water too quickly, drowning a portion of the protoplasm and 

 leaving the rest dry, thus disorganizing the cells. 



Mr. G. W. Campbell, Delaware, Ohio: My experience has been with grape-vines; 

 and we all know that a vine planted in the ground will freeze in winter deep down as 

 far as the roots grow, and thaw out gradually in the spring. I have had grape-vines 

 shipped to me in boxes, which arrived frozen solid. They were planted deeply and let 

 remain until the frost gradually left them and they received no injury. 



Prof. S. A. Beach: In one of his publications De Bary states that when freezing 

 takes place the water from the cell passes through the cell-wall and freezes on the out- 

 side forming needles of ice on the outer surface of the cell-wall. When thawing takes 

 place rapidly, the water is liberated in the midst of the tissues on the outside of the 

 cell- walls and cannot then be absorbed into its original condition as a portion of the 

 protoplasm and cell-sap. On the contrary, when the crystals are thawed out slowly, 

 the water, as fast as it thaws, is absorbed within the cell, and combines in the original 

 way with the protoplasm. 



