Winter Meeting. 165 



know your conditions down here. I have grown some apples and expect 

 to grow many more. Last year I seeded to clover and I will go back 

 home debating whether [ shall plow up the clover or let it go to blue 

 grass. What shall I do? . 



Mr. Butterfield. — I am working for the money I get. Mr. Murray 

 told this morning of an orchard which produced a crop of $32,000 with 

 good cultivation. I know an orchard of the same size that has been 

 neither pruned nor cultivated which produced a crop worth $36,000. 



A, Chandler. — The friends must remember that clover is a biennial 

 crop, living only about two years. Sow again is the only way to keep 

 ground in clover. I believe in clover. 



C. H. Dutcher. — If the clover is allowed tO' occupy the soil for two 

 3-ears it will reseed itself. 



Mr. Chandler. — You must give the clover some help if you wish it 

 to continue. Scratch the ground or work it with a cutaway harrow. 



Prof. Craig. — I have been called a cover-crop crank. When we are 

 considering the tillage and the cover crop question we are considering 

 fundamental questions. In New York the majority of the most success- 

 ful orchardists I know give clean tillage year after year ; but we use some 

 kind of cover crop which returns something to the soil and prevents waste 

 of fertility in the winter. There may be cases in which orchards are mak- 

 ing so much wood that a greater growth is not desirable. I think the 

 danger of too much growth in New York is very slight. I would 

 emphasize the point that w^e do need to cultivate. I think every tree 

 needs tillage during the growing season. In 1898-9 I was in Iowa where 

 thousands of trees were root killed. We are learning the evil of leaving 

 the ground bare in the winter. 



We will have to wait longer to see what will be the final result of 

 Mr. Hitchings' plan of grass mulch without cultivation. His conditions 

 are unusual. He has water near the surface, but it is not stagnant water, 

 I am not decrying the results of ]\Ir. Hitching's experiment. He gives 

 us just what he has done. They are valuable for his conditions. 



J. H. Hale, Connecticut. — I might almost rejoice if you Western men 

 conclude to grow fruit with little or no cultivation. Y^'pu would make 

 less competition in the markets. Y^our soil and local conditions may 

 have something to do with the question of cultivation. I have always 

 found that every thing I have ever planted gave the best results where 

 I have given the best tillage. I recommend summer pruning for too 

 rapid growth. In the peach I would cut away the strongest growing 

 upright shoots, leaving the weaker, spreading shoots to bear fruit. I 

 want to give thorougli tillage in the early months of the growing sea- 



