No. 6. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. SST 



get a crop every other year. That is very common in a great many 

 sections. We have a heavy crop of ai)i)les this year, next year 

 nothing, the third year a heavy crop again, and so on, simply because 

 when we liad so many apples, it drained so hard on the vitality 

 of that tree that there wasn't sufficient energy left in it to develop 

 the fruit buds next year and the tree had to lay off one year to 

 develop the fruit buds. Thinning will not always give you a full 

 crop every year; you must have the right varieties. But you take 

 a Roman Beauty or a Stamen Winesap and thin it hard and unless 

 you have cold weather, if you treat the tree right you will find 

 that you will get a good crop every year. The Baldwin is one 

 of the trees that won't do it, and still in Lebanon county I was 

 shown sometliing there that proves very well what thinning actually 

 will do. I visited a man one day and he took me out into his orchard 

 and there he had a great big Baldwin ay>ple tree and he said. "There 

 is an apple tree that last year was so loaded down with apples that 

 I thought it would break to pieces. At the time I should have gone 

 out to thin it, I was ill, I couldn't get out of the house, but one day 

 my wife came out and thinned that tree as high as she could reach 

 from the ground, went all around the tree on the ground and thinned 

 off the apples as high as she could reach, and when I went down 

 that summer the limbs were so loaded down that they had to be 

 propped up all around the tree, and from there to the top of the 

 tree there was scarcely an apple on the entire tree — from as high 

 as vou could reach from the ground." 



I don't want you to go home and try to thin the whole orchard, 

 but thin a few trees and thin them until you think you have taken 

 them all of!'. Better not do it yourself; better hire some other fellow, 

 because you will never thin them hard enough. I never do any thin- 

 ning at home because I can't. I like to get a good bunch of boys 

 together, boys of 15 or 16 years of age, active and not afraid to get 

 up on a ladder, take those fellows out in the orchard and show them 

 just how I want it done and I stay there just long enough until 

 I see they are doing it right, and then get out. If we stay around 

 we will always have too many apples on the tree, but if I am gone 

 they will do it right. Those fellows don't care; if I tell them to take 

 off all the apples, they will take them off, it don't make any difference 

 to them, but it would to me and I can't thin an orchard as well as 

 some fellow who is paid to do it. I thank you very kindly for your 

 attention. 



HILL SELECTION OF SEED POTATOES 



By DANIEL DEAN, President New York Potato Growers' Association, 



Nichols, N. 7. 



Seed selection is now attracting more attention than anything else 

 about potato growing. Its value has been proven by very accurate 

 experiments extending over several years at a number of experiment 

 stations. Many farmers have found seed selection to be one of 

 the most profitable parts of their work. I was one of the first in! 

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