APPENDIX. 259 



Marrons are more or less productive. The Marron de Lyon, the one that 

 produces the greatest number of nuts with one nut in the burr, or round 

 nuts, is a shy bearer, while Marron Combale and Marron Querey. for in- 

 stance, which produce nuts sino-ly and in pairs in the burrs, are enormously 

 productive. I have a tree of Marron Combale on my place, now thirty- 

 three years old. and a photograph of which was reproduced in the Pacific 

 Rural Pr-esti of December 31. 189S. that bore one hundred and thirty-six 

 pounds of nuts that year, while this year ( 1899). and when everything, in- 

 cluding apples, was killed on the night of April 27, the same tree bore one 

 hundred and fifty-three pounds of magnificent nuts, just showing how hardy 

 and productive are those French varieties of Marron chestnuts. 



Bloominy of the chestnut — Before closing I would like to call the attention 

 of the owners of chestnut trees who complain that their trees are bearing 

 lots of empty burrs, that it is no defect of the trees or the variety for acting 

 that way, as I will explain. Fruit and nut trees in general drop the blos- 

 soms or embryo fruits that have not been fertilized, for nature never in- 

 tended to have all the blossoms perfect, as it would be fatal to the longevity, 

 if not the life, of the tree. But with the chestnut the case is a different 

 one, for at blooming time all the ]nsti]hite flowers will develop a burr 

 which, whether fertilized or not, will hang on the trees, with this dift'er- 

 ence, that the unfertilized burrs will grow of a lesser size than the perfect 

 one, but shed at the same time in the fall. How many young fruit trees we 

 see covered with flowers in the spring, but finally, having but few fruits on, 

 all the balance having dropped olf, for the trees would be really unable to 

 bear and ripen a larger crop I So it is with chestnut trees, and because the 

 unfertilized or empty burrs fall at the same time as the perfect ones, when 

 the nuts are ripe, is no reason why they should all be full of nuts. When a 

 tree of the size of the Marron Combale. as represented in the Pacific Rural 

 Press, yields one hundred and fifty-three pounds of nuts, it is immaterial if 

 ten per cent, or more of the burrs are empty. At any rate, the larger and 

 older the trees the fewer the emi)ty burrs found on them. 



PREDICTION OF FEOST. 



By Prof. .1. E. Bonebright, Moscow, Idaho. 



The fruitgrowers, especially those who live in valleys, often experience 

 serious losses by late spring frosts. If warned in time it is usually possible 

 to prevent the frost, but owing to local conditions, and the efl'ect of valley 

 and mountain atmospheric currents, it often becomes impossible to predict, 

 from an evening temperature, a frost during the nig'ht. 



It is the purpose of this article to describe a piece of electrical apparatus 

 which will give warning when the temperature has dropped to a certain 

 limit. 



