540 STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



I put salt and coal ashes around Ihem, and since that have seen no blight. 

 I also cut them back. I had four Flemish Beauty. They commenced 

 blighting year before last. They were in sod, I cut back and salted, and 

 tried linseed oil, but it did not check the blight. 



W. A. Smith: Salt is not a fertilizer. It is only good as a retainer of 

 moisture. As to the blight, we can not tell anything about it. 



S. Cook: Young trees are seldom attacked with blight; not generally 

 until they come into bearing. 



Mr. Smith: Some say that it is a fungus, but nobody knows. There 

 certainly is no remedy. When the limb is struck, the first thing we know 

 the limb is dead. 



Mr. Conley: Of peaches I would set St. John, Oxford, Hinman, Rich- 

 mond, Red Cheek, Kalamazoo, and Gold Drop. Switzerland is excellent. 

 Cloud strawberry is the hardiest and the best shipper I ever had; seeds 

 quite prominent, but rather small. 



President Morrill read proposed law against spraying trees, etc., when 

 in bloom, at the meeting of February 20. 



W. A. Brown: I am opposed to lumbering up our statute books with 

 laws. It may be true that bees would be poisoned by collecting honey 

 from blossoms that were sprayed with poisons. 



W. A. Smith : I am opposed to such a law, because people who know 

 anything about it would not spray with poison when fruit trees are in 

 bloom. 



Mr. Comings: I think the law ought to be passed, as a means of 

 educating the people. 



Mr. Morrill: There is a demand for such a law. 



Mr. Webster- I think there is no harm in such a law. 



Mr. Smith: People ought to be educated as to when to spray. 



Mr. S. H. Comings: People ought to be educated, and I am in favor of 

 the law. 



Mr. Comings proposed the following: " Resolved, That we are in favor 

 of the passage of that law." Carried. 



Mr. Morrill stated that there was a bill pending for preventing hunting 

 rabbits with ferrets. 



Mr. Smith: I am in favor of offering a bounty on rabbits. 



Mr. Comings: I am in favor of destroying rabbits. 



Mr. Webster: I would place no restriction on the destruction of 

 rabbits. 



Mr. Morrill: I regard rabbits as a great nuisance, as great as rats, 

 and would put no obstacle in the way of their destruction. 



Mr. Comings offered the following: "Resolved. That we are not in 

 favor of such a law." 



Mr. Smith offered, as an amendment, that we recommend that the state 

 offer a bounty for all rabbits destroyed. Carried. The resolution as 

 amended was passed. 



The secretary read a paper by W. L. George, on "Marketing Fruits.' 1 



I assume that a " snide " package of fruit is one that has been dishonestly packed, one 

 that contains from fair to gorgeous fruits on top with inferior or worthless fruit in the 

 middle and the bottom. I have bought many such packages of fruit for shipment. I 

 have found small apples in the bottom and middle of baskets, with fine specimens of 

 peaches on top. That is what I call " snide " packages. I believe the size of an hon- 

 estly-packed package of fruit is a question of loss or gain with the shipper rather than 

 one of conscience. I would hail with joy the era of uniform fruit packages of full size, 



