512 ANNUAL REPORT OF THE Off. Doc. 



am able to get labor when I wanted it, j^et two weeks earlier I 

 could not get labor at all, for our crops come due just after the 

 cotton culture season is over and is laid b}', and they will come 

 Uiere just at tlie right time and h(dp us out on the peach harvest 

 before cotton picking begins, so it is in my Connecticut orchard, for 

 the reason that 1 am near the large cities and can bring from New 

 York and Boston a certain number of Italians, who love fruit, and 

 like to be among fruit. The}^ are working in New York in hotels, 

 as waiters, and get from eight to ten dollars in salaries, and about 

 as much in "tips," and right here I want to say that I am opposed 

 to "tips." I will pay the landlord all he asks, but I won't pay the 

 waiter one cent. I say we are able to get Italian waiters from the 

 better class of hotels to come to us through the j}each season, be- 

 cause they truly love fruit and want a picnic, and they come 

 there and camp out, and have a good time. To them it is like going 

 to the mountains, or to the shore, only the}- get paid -fD a week for 

 their fun. 



On the labor question, a man wants to be informed with reference 

 to it beforehand in the peach business, rather than afterwards, and 

 understand what the conditions are in the locality in which he puts 

 out his orchard. Those are some of the essentials. 



Now, then, we have discussed the man, and the soil, and its 

 elevation, and in relation to the market and the railroads, and the 

 labor question. Another difficult question in a way, and a very 

 serious one, is the climatic conditions, for the reason that in the 

 northern section there is the killing of buds in a dormant condition 

 in winter time. We can head that off to some extent by climbing 

 the hills and planting proper varieties, and by j)roper cultivation. 

 Now, south of this section there is the danger of early swelling 

 of the buds, and early blooming, and the spring frosts after the 

 buds open. In the north there is very little danger to the killing of 

 the bloom and buds in blooming season. I should think that was 

 the Urst and great difficulty in the way of profitable peach growing. 



Another difficulty in the way of the growing of peacti trees along 

 the Blue Range and north, is the yellows, a thing we know very little 

 about, except it is sure death when it gets in our orchards, and we 

 have to guard against that by pulling our trees out at the first sign 

 of this disease. Another difficulty is the monilia or brown rot, and 

 another, the leaf curl with certain A'arieties, notably with the yellow 

 ones, but since -we follow spraying, it is thoroughly controlled. The 

 borers are always with us, and may be kept out by banking the tree 

 during the early season, while the moth is flying, and the black 

 smut that infests our fruit, where the trees are too closely planted, 

 and where we use too much nitrogenous matter. Lastly, the San 

 Jos6 Seale, that scared the life out of us a few years ago, but it lias 

 been a benefit in some ways, because when a man is fighting that, 

 he is fighting a great many other things, and is weeding them out. 



You can't grow peaches without culture. You can't grow them 

 successfully and profitably without thorough culture. Just as 

 Prof. Warren said about the man who wants to cultivatte his orchard 

 in corn; he is a man who should go out of the peach business, and 

 go to raising corn. Just like a man in Massachusetts who planted 

 a few hundred trees and left them grow up in grass, as he said he 



