22 MISSOURI STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



WHAT CONSTITUTES A GOOD COMMERCIAL ORCHARD. 



RALPH SMITH, LACLEDE, MO. 



My object in this paper is to emphasize a few points in commercial 

 apple growing, and to briefly describe what, in the writer's view, con- 

 stitutes an ideal market apple orchard in central north Missouri. This 

 subject is broad — large enough for an extensive book — and a few 

 points only can be glanced at. 



Such an orchard should be at least ten acres in extent. A smaller 

 orchard seldom receives sufficient attention, is not considered important 

 enough to justify the requisite care. 



The site of an apple orchard should be the highest ground in any 

 particular locality. The soil should be dry, deep and rich, sloping, if 

 possible, to the northeast. The richer the soil the better. Trees 

 planted on thin, white oak lands bear profusely for a few years, but 

 unless annually enriched soon fail and disappear. 



In planting, the work should be well done. Particular attention 

 should be given to the size and shape of the holes for the trees. The 

 following statement, which we believe to be strictly true, well illus- 

 trates the importance of beginning and continuing rightly with an or- 

 chard: An energetic farmer, skillful in such branches of husbandry as 

 he had practiced, but having no experience in fruit-growing, bought, one 

 hundred young apple trees, all of choice varieties. When they were 

 delivered at his door he was just ready to leave his home for one day. 

 Along with the man who brought the trees came an English gardener 

 who offered his services, representing himself as skilled in the business 

 of tree planting. The farmer hastily showed him his orchard plot, also 

 where the necessary tools could be found, and gave such other instruc- 

 tions as he thought necessary, and hastened off for the day. Well, the 

 gardener made haste also. He soon found on the premises an ox-cart 

 and a yoke of oxen, and putting them together and taking some hay to 

 , feed now and then during the day, he proceeded to dig a hole for the 

 first tree. It was when nicely finished eight feet square and twenty 

 inches deep, exactly, and the sun was very high in the heavens, in fact 

 about as high as it ever goes. 



The faithful man then took a hasty dinner, and this done drove the 

 team off in the lots thereabout in pursuit of two flat stones, both about 



