PROCEEDINGS OF THE ANNUAL MEETING 113 



iiiul llu'ir ji<;ain c(HlK'^^ up the (lucstiou as lo wiicllier they fail or whether 

 fashions cliaiige a trifle, and one varit'ty or another is discarded as the 

 resnlt of the persistent elTorts of the i)Uint-gro\vers to introduce new 

 varieties. These tliinj^s are (|uestions. Still, 1 do believe there is occasion- 

 allv a vaiielv of fruit, of berrv, that really does run out, as thev tell about. 

 JMy ex})erien(e with new varieties is not sufficiently large to give any 

 really valuable talk on this question, and the utmost I expect to do is to 

 provoke a diseussion and find out from others what they consider to be 

 successful lu'w varieties. 



DISCUSSION. 



Mr. Fifield: I would like to ask Mr. Graham if he does not think the 

 ;small fruitgrower who is cropping his laud, especially in small fruits, that 

 after he has grown one variety on the ground and that seems to have run 

 out, and he wishes to make a change, if it is not some times profitable 

 to change the variety and not put back the same variety on the ground? 



Mr. Morrill: You may change the variety and not the species; that is, 

 a variety of strawberry, if you please, or to a variety of blackberry. 



Ml'. Fiiield: If a man were growing Sharpless strawberries would it 

 "be best to change to Eubach on the same ground, if he were replanting? 



Mr. Graham: I think if a variety fails on a certain piece of ground 

 it is because the elements required for a certain species of plant has been 

 taken out of that soil, and I do not know of any reason why Sharpless 

 should require a difl'erent element for plant growth than Bubach. I do 

 not believe that would make very much dilTerence. However, I do not 

 believe it is good policy to plant the same species of fruit on the same 

 soil very often. I do believe in changing, of course, occasionall}"; as, 

 for instance, your soil is sandy and years and years go by, reproducing 

 your plants on sand and planting them on sand. I believe it to be detri- 

 mental to the stock, that it should be changed to a different quality of 

 soil; that is, the same variety. I can not see what dilTerence a mere 

 change of variety would make, though. 



Mr. Morrill: You believe in rotation of small fruits; as, for instance, 

 •do you believe it is possible to change a strawberry patch to raspberries 

 after you have grown strawberries long enough, and change then to a 

 blackberry or currant? Now, I suppose the chemical constituents of each 

 fruit is very similar, but with me the practice of changing from one species 

 of small fruit to another one lias not seemed objectionable at all. At the 

 same time, I suppose chemistry will tell us they are very much alike, 

 would it not. Prof. Waite? 



Prof. Waite: Why, yes, I think so; but there are so many other factors 

 that would come in. 



Mr. Morrill : Yes, it is the other factors that would determine that. 



Prof. Waite: The root diseases and things of that sort. 



Mr. Graham: I have not noticed it so much with small fruit as I have 

 with large. Four or five years ago I took out an old peach orchard which 

 I think was eighteen years old. It had borne constant, heavy crops; it 

 had been well fertilized from the time the orchard was planted, it being 

 a good piece of loam soil. The orchard was removed on account of old 

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