No. 7. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 587 



Barton made the statement that you should have a new peach tree 

 every second year. This is, cut away about half the wood every 

 year. It is a simple matter of going over the tree, and taking away 

 practically one-half of the wood that is on it at the time. In New 

 Jersey they prune in the winter time with the pruning shears. Mr. 

 Horace Koberts, of New Jersey, then presented the subject of 

 ^'Chestnuts." Don't understand me to say that his talk was a 

 "chestnut;" it was not by any means. He gave us a very interest- 

 ing and instructive talk. He said the chestnut could be grown well 

 in rough land. Mr. Catchpole, of New York, sp»ke of the utiliza- 

 tion of the cull apples. I know that in our county of Adams, the 

 cull crop is live or six times what it should be. Mr. Catchpole said 

 that the only right way to settle the cull question was not to have 

 any culls. Why can't every one of us have our ideal set so high 

 that we will cultivate and prune, and look after our crops until we 

 get only good apples? Get them so uniform in size and color that 

 you have no cull crop. But of course, we do have cull apples, and 

 I am afraid we will continue to have them for some years to come. 

 The best way of disposing of these culls is probably by evaporation, 

 or vinegar, or sending them to an apple-butter factory. The next 

 'period was occupied by Mr. Cox, of the Ohio State Horticultural 

 Association, on the general subject of apples. That was a very 

 large subject, and went all the way from starting the orchard to 

 getting the fruit to market. He emphasized getting plenty of humus 

 into the soil, to retain the moisture there. The hills of southern 

 Ohio are very deep, and they have considerable difficulty in keep- 

 ing soil on them, so he mulches. One subject that should be thor- 

 oughly emphasized at our meetings is that of the necessity of spray- 

 ing. Inquiry was made of Prof, Surface here to-day what to spray 

 with. You want to know what to spray for, as well as what to spray 

 with, and then when you spray, spray thoroughly. It is a waste of 

 time to go over an orchard and spray it in a poor way. You don't 

 kill the Scale, and you don't kill the Codling Moth. Of course, the 

 tree will last a little longer, with poor spraying, but you will 

 eventually have to cut it down unless the spraying is thoroughly 

 done. Another thing Mr. Cox said they were doing in Ohio was a 

 later spraying with lime and sulphur after the leaves were out on 

 the trees. They claim it is better than the Bordeaux mixture, and 

 can be applied with perfect safety. Prof, Stewart then gave us a 

 very interesting talk, I believe I won't say anything about it, be- 

 cause he pretty well covered the same ground here. 



Prof, Wilson, of Cornell, then showed some charts illustrating the 

 results obtained from cultivation, from pasture orchards, and also 

 the results of sod treatment. The charts of sod tillage, of course 

 show that tillage had greatly the advantage, and where hogs, sheep 

 and cattle had been pastured in the orchard, it showed that the 

 hogs were preferable to anything else. I believe that lots of labor 

 can be saved by turning hogs into an orchard; they will keep the 

 soil pretty well turned up, Mr, Roberts told us how crops can be 

 grown profitably in a young orchard. It was just as Prof. Watts 

 told us about it this morning. He says no grain should be used in 

 the orchard, except possibly corn the first two years after it had 

 been planted; no kind of grain at any other time, peas and beans. 



