412 MISSOURI STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIET^y. 



DISCUSSING GRAPE CULTURE. 



At the conclusion of the readinf? of the paper an interesting dis- 

 cussion on grape culture was entered upon by tbe members of the so- 

 ciety. Mr. C. A. Green, of Kew York, thought the paper solved the 

 problem of how California grape growers could compete with eastern 

 growers. It was by employing cheap Chinese labor, and against this 

 even high freights could not protect eastern growers. Mr. Cushman, 

 of Ohio, invited the society to visit his vineyard and see what Ohio 

 grapes were like and how they were cultured. He thought he could 

 satisfy all that Buckeye soil was fruitful. Mr. F. C. Miller, in speaking 

 of different varieties of the grapes, said he was of the opinion that the 

 Worden, a seedling of the Concord, was much superior to the old fav- 

 orite. He had tried the Worden for the first time this year and was 

 much pleased with the result. His grapes were not fully ripened, and 

 he had heard that the Wordens did not hold well to the stems. He 

 did not know how true this was, and asked for information. Mr. Hub- 

 bard, of New York, said that he had been traveling for some weeks 

 among eastern vineyards, and his examinations had been very favor- 

 able to the Worden grape. All reports he had received had been to 

 the effect that the Worden clung to the stem. Mr. Hubbard said he 

 had visited Mr. Worden's vineyard in Oswego, N.Y., and had seen the 

 original vine that Mr. Worden said had yielded one hundred and ten 

 pounds of grapes during each of the past three years. The crops this 

 year were the finest the speaker had ever seen, and there was no rot. 

 The Concord was not as heavy as last year, but the Delaware and 

 other grades were doing well. The season was early and the consump- 

 tion promised to be large. The Worden, Mr. Hubbard said, was a 

 larger, handsomer and more attractive berry than the Concord and 

 ripened from a week to ten days earlier. Purchasers tasting it would 

 call it a first-class Concord. Mr. Hollister, of Missouri, reported that 

 the grape crop in his State was very short this year and the fruit had 

 rotted badly. He deprecated growers who raised early grapes and sold 

 them before they were ripe so as to get high prices for poor fruit. Mr. 

 Albaugh, of Dayton, in speaking of grape culture, said that a gentleman 

 in Montgomery county, Ohio, had sown oats between the rows of vines 

 and in this manner had preserved the grapes from rotting. Mr. Mc- 

 Kay, the president of the Mississippi Horticultural Society, in response 

 to a call said that fruit-raising in that State was a new industry. Grapes 

 had not done well this year. The Concord had done the best, had 



