240 STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



the middle ot the field. They were two-year-old trees that had been 

 growing on thin soil but two years, and were not overgrown culls, three 

 or foor years old, with tall laps and bad roots. It is needless to tell 

 you where my fine trees are now. It is further needless to say that I 

 want no more large trees shipped in boxes. I have since bought and 

 set about 6,000 trees, some one year old, some two, some three, and 

 some even four. My worst luck was with the one-year-old trees, and 

 my best lack with twos, although I have had good luck with three- 

 year-old trees when I selected them in the nursery and had them 

 delivered in hay-racks on wagons. 



I prepared a track, say forty acres, by dividing the opposite sides 

 into equal portions by means of a measuring line, setting pegs where 

 each row of trees should end. I then subdivided this again and again^ 

 by setting stakes within the tract to be set, till I separated it into 

 blocks of about 100 trees. I then took laths and placed them on two 

 sides of this block, while pegs were placed on the two other sides. 

 I then proceeded, with the help of one or two men, better with two, 

 to place small pegs where each tree was to be set. After these blocks 

 were thus made ready, I prepared a narrow board for each man who 

 was to set the trees. This board was about six feet long, with an inch 

 hole in each end and a deep notch in the exact center. Two headless 

 pins were prepared for the ends of each board. The notch was then 

 placed by the planter against the pin where the tree was to stand. 

 The headless pins were stuck through the inch holes in the board, and 

 were fixed firmly into the ground. The board was then removed, 

 leaving the inch pins in the ground, the hole was dug with a spade, 

 the tree was placed in the hole, the plank was placed in its former 

 place, the tree was brought into the notch, the dirt was carefully 

 pressed around the roots with the hands till the tree was firm in its 

 place, the plank was again removed, and the work was finished with 

 the spade and feet, always leaving the ground firm about the tree. I 

 set the trees only about an inch deeper than they were in the nursery, 

 but drew the dirt around the tree considerably higher than the general 

 level of the surrounding land. This is especially necessary if the 

 setting is done in the fall. All things considered, I prefer to set in 

 the spring. 



After setting the first lot of 3,000, I was told that it would be a 

 good thing to get elm board wraps to keep off rabbits and borers. 

 But I learned to my loss that these same wraps were the finest of 

 harbors for mice and the woolly aphis, and I lost more trees from the 

 ravages of mice than I have ever lost from rabbits. It is fair to say, 

 however, that I have not given the rabbits the same favorable oppor- 



