No. 6. DEPARTMENT OP AGRICULTURE. 563 



range of orchard management. There are practically only three 

 systems, viz. — The Sod System — The Mulch System — and The Cul- 

 tural System, and a brief discussion of these will, by comparison, 

 perhaps enable us to apply them, with some modifications suited to 

 our several conditions and environments, profitably. 



There is no study of nature so attractive,. so inspiring or so ele- 

 vating as the study of Fruits and Flowers; it enlarges man's views 

 of creative wisdom as no other study can. And when we fullv realize 

 that a tree is only an instrument with great possibilities in the 

 hands of man to mould, to form, through and by which to create 

 the one product of universal desire and of universal health; in fact, 

 to recognize a fruit tree as being a machine that will produce a 

 product in accord with the kind of food and attention the tree 

 received, we must first know the constituent elements of tree and 

 fruit, and the best system by which these elements can be supplied. 



As an illustration, a mature apple tree with a crop of fruit; that 

 is to say, a tree fifteen to twenty years old, producing twenty bushels 

 of apples will take from the soil 1.47 pounds nitrogen, 0.39 pounds 

 phosphoric acid, 1.57 pounds potash; thus an acre of apples set 40 

 feet apart, which would give thirty-five trees to the acre, would 

 require 51.5 pounds of nitrogen, 14.0 pounds of phosphoric acid and 

 55.0 pounds potash, necessary to grow the fruit, leaves and wood 

 of a tree of mature age and producing an average crop of fruit. 

 The commercial value of these plant food elements required to pro- 

 duce the crop of fruit as stated is $11.27. For the purpose of com- 

 parison, a crop of wheat, which will yield twenty bushels per acre 

 will remove from the soil 39 pounds of nitrogen, 12 pounds phosphoric 

 acid and 16 pounds potash, the commercial value of which is $7.25; 

 showing that there is required to produce a crop of fruit $4.02 worth 

 more of the necessary plant food elements, than that required to 

 produce a crop of wheat. This is significant, in that few farmers 

 at the present day would undertake to grow a crop of wheat with- 

 out supplying to the soil, upon which that crop was to be grown the 

 plant food elements that the crop required to the extent of the 

 knowledge and ability of the person growing the crop to supply 

 them. There are still two other important facts revealed by the 

 study of this phase of the question, before we can intelligently 

 consider the subject under consideration, viz. — the relatively small 

 amount of phosphoric acid required as compared with that of nitro- 

 gen and potash, and the further fact that these plant food elements 

 must be supplied in their proper ratio; an excess of one will not 

 make up for the deficiency of the other; but experiments have 

 fdiown that the crop can only be measured by the standard of a 

 fully balanced ration. A deficiency in any one of the plant food 

 elements lowers the ration to the extent of such deficiency, that 

 these conclusions are correct and cannot be refuted is proven by 

 the law of nature which controls in the animal kingdom, obtains 

 in the vegetable world with equal force and effect, therefore, to 

 produce a tree, which will bear every year and produce fruit of 

 quality of the very highest attainment possible, we must feed the 

 tree a perfectly full balanced ration of nitrogen, phosphoric acid 

 and potash, keep the trees immune from the attacks of fungus and 

 insect pests, supply the necessary moisture, prune so as to afford 

 the sunlight reaching every leaf that that great mechanical force 



