REPORTS OF LOCAL SOCIETIES. 361 



many of the fibers that had sought the surface soil on account of the 

 shade given by the grass. No small grain should ever be grown among 

 trees for the same reason. If the ground is allowed to get very hard 

 and dry, many of the fibers will die and the vitality of the tree be injured. 

 The same effect will be i)roduced by the tree standing in water, as the 

 fibers will not live in water. (xVquatic plants have no fibers.) Hence 

 the need of drainage, if not naturally so, artificial means must be used 

 to get rid of all stagnant water in the soil. 



A few words on the raspberry and I am done. 



Some members of our society complain of the Turner winter kill- 

 ing, when ordinarily it is iron-clad. Its lack of hardiness is caused by 

 lack of cultivation, the very cause I have just described. The red 

 raspberry is objected to by some on account of its suckering. This is 

 easily overcome. When the suckers are a few inches high, hoe or 

 plow them off, leaving just enough to bear next year's crop. In spring 

 cut back to thirty inches of the ground, and an occasional plowing 

 during the summer, and the Turner will go through winter without in- 

 jury. In neglect of cultivation it is the summer heat and not cold that 

 kills. The Black Caps require nearly the same cultivation, except the 

 young growth should be pinched at 18 or 20 inches, thus causing it to 

 throw out laterals near the ground, and less liable to be blown down 

 and destroyed than if not pinched. Cut back the laterals in early 

 spring to within about a foot of the main stock, at the same time cut 

 away the old canes — those that bore fruit the previous year. Now the 

 cause of winter killing of trees is either an excessive amount of water 

 in the soil, or a soft, late growth, winter finding them with their struc- 

 ture full of crude sap that has not had time to be assimilated and the 

 wood hardened. But if a steady growth had been kept up during the 

 growing season, nature's laws would have stopped its growth and prop- 

 erly ripened it up in season and prevented injury by the latter cause. 

 There is no such thing as luck in growing trees but a continual persist- 

 ant work and that in conformity with the immutable laws of nature. 



