154 STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



objection in regard to thinning might be brought up with apples. " Do 

 you thinlv we could go over our apple trees and take off the apples?" But 

 it is practicable. 



It does not cost so much as to take them off after they are ripe. I 

 don't say this from theory alone, because I have tried it myself in a 

 small way. I have not had the opportunity to carry it out extensively 

 at all, but I have talked with these gentlemen I have mentioned, and 

 others. Mr. Powell of New York, for instance, thins everything on his 

 place. Mr. S. D. Willard does the same, and all these successful men 

 are in the thinning business, and they say it has paid them abundantly. 

 If it will pay others, it will pay you. We have biennial bearers — we call 

 them alternate bearers. Why? Because, as is their nature, they put on 

 too big a crop, and you allow it to stay on, and it so devitalizes the tree 

 that it can not do anything next year. The tree must rest. That is what 

 makes a biennial bearer. 



I suppose you have had spraying talked to you here. You have eminent 

 men here, who have made careful experiments, and I have no doubt you 

 have had it well talked up. You can no more afford to do without spray- 

 ing than without the cultivator. It is just as much a part of the farm 

 appliances as the plow or harrow, in this day and age of the world. You 

 must keep up with the procession, or you will be left behind. 



If I had but one piece of advice to give to any one in the commercial 

 fruitgrowing business, I would say, do it thoroughly, and aim to raise 

 only the highest grade of fruit, and you will be abundantly paid for it. 



DISCUSSION. 



Mr. Berckmans of Georgia: As we have not had any practical expe- 

 rience in fruit in some years, I do not think our opinion would be of any 

 weight at all. I will say, however, that when we were in that business 

 we found thinning fruit very successful, especially with the Japanese 

 plums and the different varieties of peach, 



Mr. Dunlap of Illinois: I have been waiting to hear from the Michigan 

 men on this subject. I think they are much better posted than any one 

 from Illinois. I will only say that the past season has certainly empha- 

 sized the fact that there is a financially successful future, for the com- 

 mercial fruitgrower, even among the men of Illinois, who are engaged 

 largely in apple-growing. We find that those men who went into the 

 orchards of central and southern Illinois last year, and bought apples for 

 sixty cents per barrel, have been selling them this spring as high as $6 

 per barrel. The way to make the thing thoroughly successful, is not only 

 to grow the fruit successfully but to market it successfully. It is fully 

 as important to market it properly as to grow it properly. I think this 

 point can not be emphasized too emphatically. We find, too, in Illinois, 

 that the cold storage facilities have in the last few years been of great 

 advantage to us. We can place our apples in cold storage after harvest, 

 right from the orchards, and sell them in the spring without having them 

 repacked at all. No expense except that of storing. I have found that 

 some of the most important things we have learned in fruitgrowing have 

 been emphasized in what we have seen this morning — thorough cultiva- 



