TWENTY THIRD ANNUAL MEETING. 71 



through Macomb county, the past year. Some varieties of pear have done 

 well, as Clapp's Favorite, Sheldon, and Flemish Beauty, though the last 

 named were very scabby with me. I have two trees of the Tyson that are 

 both vigorous and strong and have given good crops of fruit, clear of scab, 

 every year since they came into bearing. The greatest objection to the 

 Tyson is a tendency to come into bearing very slowly. It is a good orchard 

 tree if you can wait, and will pay well for the time lost when it does come. 



With grapes, it is not every year that we can ripen the Concord. Of 

 course, anything later would be of no use. We can never raise grapes to 

 compete with those from the islands in lake Erie. If ours ripen at all, it 

 is when theirs have been ripe so much longer that ours seem very sour. 



A few specimens of quince are growing, yet buyers say that they have 

 never known a peck of home-grown quinces to come in for sale. 



Plums are grown but little, for market, but they do well and are fine. I 

 know of but one or two men who have made any pretense of combating 

 the curculio, and they use the sheet and have large crops. This year about 

 one fourth of the trees through the county had good crops, but fifty per 

 cent, of the fruit rotted just as it began to ripen. Last year was our year 

 for a good, full crop of plums. 



Strawberries were a full crop, but as none were shipped out of the 

 country the market was very low — $1.40 to $1.75 per bushel. Black-cap 

 raspberries were not more than one third of a crop, and brought $3.20 per 

 bushel through the season. Red raspberries, about a half crop, and the 

 market was not fully supplied at $4 per bushel. 



Sanilac county lies on the shore fifteen miles from the lower end of lake 

 Huron, with a shore line of nearly forty miles, its principal ports being 

 Lexington, Port Sanilac, Richmondville, and Forestville. The land is high, 

 rolling from the lake to Black river, and from there it is low and in many 

 cases marshy. What I have said of St. Clair county fruits will apply to 

 Sanilac county, except in the north part, were the apples were very good. 

 From 15,000 to 20,000 barrels were shipped from this part of the country. 

 Many new orchards of all kinds of fruit, but especially of peaches and 

 some plums, were planted last spring. Lexington lies twenty-two miles 

 north of Port Huron and seven miles north of the south line of Sanilac 

 county, and it is on the same latitude as Rochester, N. Y. The north part 

 of St. Clair county and the south part of Sanilac county are in the same 

 latitude as western New York, yet I doubt if you will find a single good, 

 healthy orchard, such as would be found there. Most of them show signs 

 of neglect and disease; yet, in favorable seasons, we have a good many 

 apples of very fine quality. It would be very foolish to think of planting 

 apples anywhere in St. Clair county, for profit, except in very favorable 

 places, or after the ground is well underdrained. Plums seem to do even 

 better than apples, and pears seem to promise well if the scab and cracking 

 can be checked; and on these same well-drained soils, the hardy varieties 

 of peach promise well. Yet I should not recommend promiscuous plant- 

 ing of fruits of any kind, except the small fruits, with any prospect of 

 making money. Only intelligent and thorough work will ever give us 

 favorable results. 



Huron county occupies the end of "the thumb," and might well be called 

 the "thumb nail." It has a coast line of about sixty miles, bordering 

 about equally on lake Huron and Saginaw bay. It is scarcely thirty years 

 since the first settlers came with the great lumber firms that cut away the 

 pine. Their earliest clearings were planted with fruit trees, which grew 



