84 STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



SOME INSTANCES OF SUCCESS. 



There are those in your own state whose methods of culture and experi- 

 ence could enable them to give you illustrations of their work and results 

 that would, I am sure, be quite astonishing; and I trust I may not be 

 regarded as overstepping the bounds of propriety in quoting instances of 

 what has been accomplished in the production of different fruits in other 

 sections, in illustration of "our possibilities." 



Several years since, a party in planting an orchard of apples was told by 

 an old man that he would never live to see a paying crop from it. This 

 may have inspired him to accomplish results that, under other circum- 

 stances, might not have been attained. The eighth year from planting, 

 from seven hundred trees, he picked seven hundred barrels. 



Not far away, upon the same ridge, stands an orchard of three hundred 

 trees, twenty-two years planted, that has never yet, in its entire product, 

 produced an amount per tree equal to the other in its eighth season. The 

 one is a striking illustration of the result of good care and judicious feed- 

 ing, the other an equal illustration of the folly of neglect. 



Upon what was one of the best grain farms of our state, fifteen years 

 ago, was planted a small pear orchard. Said the owner to me last season, 

 "for four years those pear trees have given me more clear money than the 

 remainder of the farm of 131 acres — four acres against 131 acres. What a 

 lesson in percentage! 



Five years ago, a man of more good sense than capital paid $175 per 

 acre for 16 acres which he immediately planted to pears, quinces, plums, 

 peaches, and cherries. In compliance with my request, lately he kindly 

 gave the facts and figures as to his operations. The fourth year his net 

 returns amounted to $600. The past season, $1,875. Total cost, $5,000. 

 Interest, $1,500. In all, $6,500. Eeturns, $1,975. Another opportunity 

 to study the question of percentage. 



A small orchard of sour cherries, planted eighteen years ago, has 

 returned to the owner an average of $10 net per tree for the past ten years. 

 As this fruit can be planted at the rate of 100 trees per acre, surely cherry- 

 growing ought to be regarded as sufficiently profitable, even though the 

 product be divided by two or three. 



An acquaintance, with 100 trees of Fellenberg or Italian prune, sold the 

 crop of 1892 for $1,000. 



Three years ago in October last, were planted 100 dwarf pears which, in 

 the June following, were rebudded or worked over into another variety, 

 and being exceedingly thrifty, the buds were at once forced out to save a 

 season's growth. The crop from same was sold in the month of November 

 for $98.50. Multiply this by four, as 400 dwarf pears can be grown to the 

 acre, and the result is no mean comment on the much-abused Kieffer pear, 

 which ranks in the orchard list of profitable sorts. 



A party engaged in growing currants for market has for three years 

 kept an account of the disbursements and receipts from a single acre 

 devoted to this fruit, and he tells me that his average net returns are about 

 $160. 



On a more extended scale, an orchard of thirty acres, made up of an 

 assortment of all fruits, has given the owner for the past nine years net 

 returns ec^ual to $3,500 per annum. This orchard is seventeen years 

 planted but this sum does not include the crop of 1892, which yielded 

 about $6,000. 



