DEPARTMENT REPORTS. 35 



The club is proving a valuable adjunct to the class-room work. It is 

 one of the first, if not the first, distinctively student horticultural club 

 in this country. 



ASSISTANTS. 



Mr. Thomas Gunson, 3Ir. M. L. Dean, and Mr. H. Sherman have re- 

 tained the positions filled by them in former years, and have ably per- 

 formed their duties. In addition, Mr. B. Wermuth of the class of 1902, 

 was paid from the department funds for assisting in the laboratory 

 during the last six months of the year. 



Now that the former labor period is given up to strictly educational 

 work, students in the department need more supervision. Horticultural 

 operations are carried on in the greenhouses, orchards, on the campus 

 and in the laboratory. The supervisors must go from place to place, 

 often leaving students without supervision for long periods. This is 

 almost never satisfactory and a sufficient number of supervisors should 

 be provided. It is reasonable to suppose that the value of the horticul- 

 tural laboratory work is determined by the manner of its supervision. 

 There is need of at least one more assistant for the coming year. 



NON-HORTICULTURAL MATTERS. 



The most burdensome and annoying work on the department at the 

 present time is that which has nothing to do with teaching horticulture. 

 I refer to the errand, the ice, the vegetable, the fuel, the scavenger, and 

 the general utility work now imposed upon the department. The time 

 was when the limited amount of this work necessary for the college com- 

 munity could be done by the department without much trouble, but the 

 great growth of the community has changed this, and the non-horticul- 

 tural and the non-professional work referred to above is now almost an 

 intolerable nuisance. Eelief could be given by assigning this work to 

 some one person not having to do with the professional work of the 

 College. 



Very respectfullv submitted, 



U. P. HEDRICK, 

 Professor of Horticulture and Landscape Gardening. 



Agricultural College, Mich. 

 June 30, 1903. 



