130 STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



When I have a carload I send them east and always get a good price. 

 We have done fairly well in Minneapolis and St. Panl, but we have 

 found Pittsburg the best market for the Seckel pear that we know of. 



Mr. Farrand — I ran across a man last season who was digging np an 

 orchard of Bartlett pears twenty-one years old. They had never had 

 any blight, and the reason why he was doing this was because the 

 orchard was not profitable. On the same farm was ten acres of Kieffer 

 pears that had always been profitable. But imagine a man digging up 

 ten acres of Bartlett pears, twenty-one years old, because they were not 

 profitable. It seemed like a shame. 



Mr. Rose — The trouble must have been that there was some mistake 

 in handling them. 



Mr. Keasey — I just want to tell a little incident. ]My wife and I one 

 day met two men who were on their way to Mr. Chatfield's, they said, 

 to make trouble, because he was spraying when his trees were in bloom. 

 I told them they need not go there if trouble was what they were after, 

 for I was doing the same thing and we drove on a little further and 

 stopped at a neighbor and found he was doing the same thing. Mr. 

 Chatfield did not get into trouble, neither did we. 



A Member — We raise pears on sandy as well as on clay soil. I can 

 raise as good pears on one kind as on another. I had a failure and then 

 I began spraying just before the blossoms opened. So far as the matter 

 of soil is concerned, I do not know how to account for the difference. 

 Perhaps the difference is due to location, but I have never seen pears 

 blight to any extent on sandy soil, while I have seen on clay soils w^hole 

 orchards taken off by blight. 



Question — I would like to inquire if the Kieffer is self- fertilizing? I 

 have an orchard of 1,000 Kieffer pears, an ideal orchard, very healthy, 

 but they have never borne 100 bushels of pears, and the orchard is fif- 

 teen years old. 



Mr. Farrand — I could not answer the question. 



A Member — There are many in our neighborhood who are raising 

 Kieffer pears all right, and they are profitable. 



A Member — I planted an orchard, taking for my authority a Washing- 

 ton Bulletin, and in this I planted every fourth row running north and 

 south in Bartletts, and the trees fertilized all right. Since then I have 

 learned the same high authority that they would not fertilize. But to- 

 day the Kieffer pears from this orchard are selling for fifty cents a peck 

 in Chicago. And here I would like to say that I do not think many are 

 catering to a select enough market — we can do something better than 

 many are doing. 



Mr. Farrand — It would be my advice that Mr. Keasey would do well 

 to graft his trees to Bartletts rather than pull them out. In this way 

 he could save the years of growth. 



Mr. Keasey — I think I will. 



A Member — What is the best market pear? 



Mr. Chatfield — The Bartlett, by all means. 



A Member— Is it absolutely certain that the Kieffer can be top- 

 worked to another kind? 



Mr. Chatfield— Yes it is. 



A Member — Is it a success? 



Mr. Chatfield— No; at least that is my opinion. I have grafted 



