498 



ANNUAI. REPORT OF THE 



Off. Doc. 



ance of the many questions that are concerned with success in apple 

 production. 



We found that tillage had more inllunnce on jield and income than 

 any other question. Spraying was generally second in importance, 

 but in some years it took first place. 



In the towaiship of Walworth, in Wayne county, every orchard 

 as large as one acre was examined. Table I shows the yields of the 

 tilled and sod orchards for the years 1902 and 1903. 



TABLE I. 



Averag-e Yield in Bushels of Tilled and Untilled Orchards, Walworth Town- 

 ship, Wayne County, New York. 



The entire county was examined in the same way, except that 

 only the larger orchards were taken in the remainder, usually those 

 containing about ten acres or more. The four-year averages for the 

 county are given in Table II. This shows that the tilled orchards 

 averaged about 80 per cent, larger yield than the untilled. A part 

 of this great ditTerence is doubtless due to other factors. The man 

 who regularly tills his orchard is more likely to fertilize, prune 

 and spray well. To see how much of this difference is due to tillage 

 and how much is due to other factors another classification was 

 made. This is shoAvn in the second column, well-cared-for orchards. 

 All these have received some fertilization, have been fairly well 

 pruned, are not diseased or in bad condition from any causes. Of 

 these well-cared-for orchards the tilled ones gave an average of 35 

 per cent, above the untilled. This tabulation doubtless gives too 

 high a yield for the orchards in sod, for in making it all diseased ones 

 were thrown out. In many cases these should hav*' been included^ 

 for the disease frequently gets a foothold because the sod has 

 lowered the vitality of the trees. The real difference due to sod will 

 therefore lie betv/een the SO per cent, shown by the first column and 

 the 35 per cent, shown by the second column. 



