10 STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



during the progress of the growth of the fruit as possible. After the 

 peas are harvested we go over the orchard with a mowing machine and 

 clip off whatever weeds there are and we have the ground pretty 

 thoroughly mulched with pea-straw and weeds. We had rather have 

 weeds than bare ground, but we do not like to have weeds, we had rather 

 have peas. 



I need not tell you that (his plan of enriching the orchard is not very 

 expensive. When we can buy corn at sixty-seven cents and sell pork on 

 foot for seven to ten cents the hog proposition will take care of itself, 

 so we have been very liberal in this kind of fertilizer in the orchard. 

 And I might say that when the hogs are not in there we have enough 

 of the mulch to almost cover the soil. It is about all we can turn under 

 with the ordinary plough the next spring. I think we get good results 

 by having this ground covered with this mulch and we try to keep down 

 all the drain from the soil while the fruit is in that critical condition 

 of not having enough moisture during the month of August; however, 

 we have had a plenty of it during the past two years, but this is the 

 month that there is the greatest danger from this cause, and we have 

 adopted this plan while the fruit was. in the heighth of its development. 



This is about all of our system of feeding the orchard and I do not 

 know but it is far enough for me to go along on this line. 



There are, however, some other conditions which make for successful 

 apple growing that are not' fully tied up in the feeding. 



If we were to feed a horse or a dairy cow we would as far as possible 

 eliminate all the conditions whereby they might consume food un- 

 profitable-, and this we aim to do for our orchard with the pruning 

 shears. We wish the trees to bear fruit; at the same time we do not 

 want them to over-bear. It has become an established fact that the 

 core and the stem of the apple take more phosphoric acid than the 

 pulp itself. The pulp is made up, according to analysis, of 92% of 

 water and sunshine — no drain on the soil. We try to eliminate the un- 

 profitable growth of small apples; and while this has been a discourag- 

 ing year for apple growers I do not think we should lie down until 

 we can make every apple as good as these here shown on this table. 

 In a close tab kept on our packing we found that we were able to 

 gel about 75% of this kind. 



This system has eliminated the Codling Moth. We are not troubled 

 with it now at all. This year has been an unusually bad one for the 

 fungus and we have had more difficulty along this line this year than 

 from any or all other causes together. 



It is not necessary to take up any more time in discussing this phase 

 of the question. 1 have been in a few of these meetings and have found 

 that the most profitable part of the meetings is what: comes out in the 

 discussion, and if 1 have not made myself plain along this line I am 

 here to answer any questions or explain any subject that I have not 

 fully covered. 



In maintaining the fertility of the orchard, as I said at the outset, 

 we must plan to conserve this fertility for at least seventy-five to one 

 hundred twenty-five years. 



You men who are growing peaches do not come in this class at 

 all; we who are growing apples must provide for the longer term of 



