PROCEEDINGS OF THE ANNUAL MEETING. 201 



cominj^ secretary may be relieved of cramping liis volume as I have had 

 to do in the present instance. There are many things which it would 

 have been well to have included in the Report, which, for the reasons I 

 have stated, had to be excluded. 



There has not been,- in the past year, within my knowledge, any unusual 

 development of diseases of fruit trees. There have been all the evils with 

 us that ^ve have ever had, bur there seems to have been less of the insects 

 and no great revival or increase of yellows or black knot or apple 

 scab, nor of the new disease, "little peach," as it is called, which has 

 appeared in Allegan county. There seems to be a disposition to regard 

 this new disease as a northern form of rosette. Without having seen 

 anything of rosette except by illustration, I would be inclined to that 

 opinion, but it does not seem to result quite so quickly in the death of the 



" tree as rosette does in the south ; but it does result in the immediate 

 uselessness of the fruit. The fruit in the first season of the disease 

 becomes valueless for the market. You can not even ship it, as some dis- 

 honest fruitgrowers do with yellows fruit, because it is not developed in 

 size. I regret that I have to believe that it would be treated in the same 

 way if it were possible. ]N'ot all the dishonesty, not all the chicanery and 

 tricker}', is confined to the commission merchants nor to any other par- 

 ticular class of people who handle fruit. 



There seems to be a disposition among all the commission men of 

 Chicago and Milwaukee, so far as I have talked with them, to decry the 



packing of IMichigan fruits. They say that it has increased in quality 

 very little if at all, and they are constantly met with objections to 

 Michigan fruit as against that of the state of New York, and still 

 more so as against that of Canada, which has been very freely 

 imported this year. The Canadian fruit was better than ours in 

 some respects. That portion which reached the market was better, 

 probably, because the inferior portion was kept at home. They were 

 full-size barrels and were better packed; they were packed for this market 

 as they would have been and were packed for that of Europe, with the 

 result that our fruit, aided by some other conditions which Mr. Morrill 

 will mention, has been at a discount in the Chicago market, and the com- 

 mission men were praying for the closing of navigation on the lakes that 

 there might be a better state of the market for the fruit nearer home. 

 There has been no closing as yet, unless this severe weather shall have 

 brought it; and if any of you have apples yet to sell, and if you ever pray 

 and have faith in prayer, it would be well for you to supplicate the 

 Almighty to close the straits of Mackinac and boom the apple crop of 

 Michigan, for up to date it has not been a source of profit; and while T 

 say that, there are instances within my knowledge, within my own 

 county, whirh indicate that all this matter of profit and loss is dependent 

 upon individual effort. I know men who let their apples hang on the 

 trees and drop to the ground and made no effort to dispose of them, 

 although there was a market at some price in ray own town for every 

 bushel of fruit that could be brought there. That was not the case at 

 every point in my couuty by any means; but it was the case in very many 

 places in this state. I know many men who have orchards which paid 

 them because, as soon as an apple could be sold, they began picking and 

 26 



