Miscellaneous. H63 



abate. Man's part in all amelioration of his condition is to bring nature's 

 materials and forces tog^ether, or to keep them apart, according to the 

 results he desires, and she does the rest. The farmer's problems involve 

 learning h'ow to bring these forces and materials into the desired rela- 

 tion. — J. T. Willard, in Farm Life, Manhattan, Kansas. 



IGNORANCE IN HORTICULTURE. 

 (Alvin Dickson, Benton Co., Ark.) 



Gentlemen of the Benton County Horticultural Society : 



I have chosen for my subject, "Ignorance in Horticulture," not a 

 very pleasant or popular subject, but one we cannot afford to ignore, as 

 evidence of the fact that it does prevail in our midst to an alarming ex- 

 tent. Look at the small attendance at the meetings of this society, whose 

 sole object is the dissemination of practical and useful knowledge of horti- 

 culture. (It is true we have a few smart alex, but you will probably find 

 them in all public gatherings.) When we consider the number of per- 

 sons who are engaged in growing fruit and the number who have come 

 into this county in the last two years and bought land and are engaging 

 in the fruit business, and a large majority of them have had no practical 

 experience in growing fruit, one would suppose that it would be difficult 

 to obtain a hall large enough to accommodate these monthly meetings of 

 this society, but, alas! at a majority of these meetings you could count 

 them on your fingers. When we consider the revenue our annual crops 

 of fruit are sold for, and that is the principal source from which we 

 expect it in the future, and the rapid ratio in which the fruit business is 

 increasing in the whole Ozark country, one is amazed at the lethargy and 

 indifference manifested by the fruit growers. 



iWhen one looks at the interest that the general government is taking 

 and the money it is annually expending in maintaining a department of 

 pomology and horticulture. The hundreds, and I might say the thousands, 

 of useful bulletins they are annually distributing free to all who will apply 

 for them, and when we consider the investigation and tests that our State 

 Experiment Stations are making and the work they are doing for our bene- 

 fit, which information is distributed through their bulletins free to all those 

 who ask. When many states are aiding their state societies by appropriating 

 funds to publish their annual reports which are collections in book form, 

 of all the valuable papers read and the discussions that follow on various 

 lines of horticulture, such as how to plant, prune, cultivate, spray and 

 market, and a thousand and one different phases of horticulture by fruit 



