66 STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



* 



In my experience I have learned not to transplant suckers into the field for 

 a plantation ; that, while a large growth may be made, the canes will be weak 

 and go sprawling over, or fall upon the ground, requiring much mulching, or 

 leaving much of the fruit the following season to be injured by being soiled. 

 This has taught me to make haste slowly, except in special cases. 



DISTANCES FOE EXTENSIVE PLANTATIONS. 



T. T. Lyon: I would have the rows seven feet apart for black-caps or black- 

 berries. 



C. W. Garfield: Our plantations of black-caps have the rows eight feet 

 apart, so that we can cultivate them early in the season with two horses. Some 

 like the Acme harrow for this purpose. 



MULCHING. 



E. H. Scott: The best mulch is good cultivation. I think mulch generally 

 injurious, unless applied just before time of ripening. Mulched plants root 

 shallow, and so dry up in times of drought. I cultivate in the row with a 

 spading fork. I never use a hoe. 



The president then announced the following committees: 

 On Exhibits — Hewitt, of Hillsdale; Fuller, of Eaton; Sessions, 

 of Oceana. 



On Resolutions — Gibbons, of Wayne; Crozier, of Kert; Tracy, of Wayne. 



Afternoon Session. 



Vice-President Gibson in the chair. 



The chairman said that inasmuch as a discussion on blackberry culture 

 would involve much that had been said in discussing raspberries, and as the 

 programme called for another subject at this hour it might be well to pass, at 

 least for the present, the blackberry topics and take up 



GRAPES. 



On the " Botany of Grapes " Prof. L. H. Bailey said : 



Vitis vinifera, the species to which the grapes of our hot-houses belong, was 

 introduced into this country from Europe, but failed for out-door culture, not 

 only at the North, where it proved too tender, but also at the South. The 

 failure there was found to be due to the attacks of the phylloxera, an insect 

 not found in Europe. Though native to America, the phylloxera does not se- 

 riously injure the American grapes. When the improvement of our native 

 grapes began, grape culture in this country took a new start. One of the first 

 introduced into cultivation was the Alexander, a variety of Vitis riparia of our 

 river banks. All of our grapes are derived from American species, or hybrids 

 between these and the European Vitis vinifera." Vitis riparia has been intro- 

 duced into Europe in the hope that it will there withstand the ravages of the 

 phylloxera, which has found its way into European vineyards. The American 

 grape mildew has also found its w;iy to Europe, and is becoming destructive to 



