182 * MISSOURI STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



CARE, CULTIVATION AND PRUNING OF THE APPLE OR- 

 CHARD. 



BY N. F. MURRY, ELM GROVE. 



The subject or subjects you have assigned me, are all and each of 

 first importance to success in producing Missouri's greatest fruit staple* 

 and need to be well understood and diligently carried into practice by 

 every one who wishes or expects to make apple growing a success^ 

 After all that has been said and written to educate the people and to 

 advance the fruit growing interests of our country, I am safe in say- 

 ing, from my own experience* and observation, for thirty years amon^ 

 the people, east and west, that not more than one-fourth of the apple 

 trees planted ever reached the fruiting period, and a large per cent, of 

 those that do in their neglected condition escape the ravages of stocky 

 rabbits, gophers, borers and injurious insects, never become paying 

 trees. The very appearance of such orchards only tends to discour- 

 age and weaken the general interest in apple growing. 



In what way can we accomplish a change for the better. I answer,, 

 by educating the people on these important qnestions, not alone by 

 precept, but by the example of more and more successful orchards. 



Very much has already been accomplished in this direction by our 

 State and county horticultural societies, but the task is only begun. I 

 earnestly wish that our people throughout this great State, where God 

 and bounteous nature have done so much for man, could be fully 

 awakened and led to more fully appreciate the importance of this 

 great and grand subject. This done, and apple growing would receive 

 an impetus that would soon bring a degree of ^prosperity hardly yet 

 dreamed of. Fruit-growers, if true to our noble trust, we will do all 

 we can in this work through our organizations, and let us remember that 

 as individuals we have before us a wide and open field for much needed 

 and useful labor, and one in which we can accomplish a part of what 

 God requires of each one of us — that we do what we can to make the 

 world better and happier while passing through it. 



In presenting my views on the first part of our subject, "care of the 

 apple orchard," we will start with the young trees just after planting. 

 Supposing them to have been good trees, planted in good average 



