ipiS 



BETTER FRUIT 



Page ii 



BEFORE using Cement Coated Nails 



Western Cement Coated Nails 

 for Western Growers 



Our Cement Coated Nails are always of 

 uniform length, gauge, head and count. 

 Especially adapted to the manufacture of 

 fruit boxes and crates. In brief, they are 

 the Best on the Market. 



Write for Growers' testimonials. 



Colorado Fuel & Iron Co. 



DENVER, COLORADO 



Pacific Coast Sales Offices 



Portland, Spokane, San Francisco 



Los Angeles 



AFTER use of C. F. & I. Co.' 

 Cement Coated Nails 



winter, followed by heavy rain and 

 snow in February, which fell on frozen 

 ground and nearly all ran off. The 

 trees bloomed and set on fruit normally 

 in the spring. Then in May came the 

 coldest late freeze on record. The tem- 

 peratures were: May 10, 18 above; May 

 11, 21; May 12, 19; May 13, 23; May 14, 

 31; May 15, 24. This was quite a shock 

 to the fruit trees. The average mini- 

 mum daily temperature for May, 1016, 

 was 33.8. Compare this with the aver- 

 age daily minimum temperature for De- 

 cember, 1917, which was 32. We have 

 kept a strict daily record of the maxi- 

 mum and minimum daily temperature 

 at the ranch the past five years, and 

 find it quite interesting in making com- 

 parisons. 



As you know, the winter of 1916 and 

 1917 was very cold and long; a late 

 spring followed by extreme heat in 

 July, with a very low degree relative 

 humidity. All these climatic conditions 

 seemed to have run down the vitality of 

 the young prune trees until they were 

 unable to mature their fruit. It being 

 the nature of the Italian prune to shed 

 what fruit it cannot well mature. 



In maketing the prunes it is the in- 

 tention, of course, to ship as much fresh 

 fruit to Eastern markets as possible. 

 While in the East last month, I made 

 investigations in several large markets 

 regarding the demand for the Italian 

 prune and found them all wanting more 

 Italian prunes, and the prices are good 

 as compared with previous years. They 



are getting to be a favorite fruit with 

 all classes of people in countries where 

 they cannot be raised. The farmers' 

 wives throughout the Middle West are 

 anxious every fall to get a few boxes 

 of Italian prunes (big blue plums, as 

 they generally call them) to can for 

 home use. Taking everything into con- 

 sideration, the future for the prune in- 

 dustry looks very bright. It is the in- 

 tention of the Swiss Valley people to 

 build drying plants, etc., to handle by- 

 products and take care of all fruit that 

 cannot be handled fresh, and so de- 

 velop their 200 acres of Italian prune 

 orchard that will make it one of the 

 greatest commercial prune enterprises 

 in the Northwest. 



Benefits in Horticulture from Cross-Pollination 



THE term cross-pollination in com- 

 mon usage means the transfer of 

 pollen between flowers borne upon 

 different plants. On the other hand, 

 self-pollination refers to the transfer 

 of pollen between parts of the same 

 flower or between ilowers of the same, 

 plant. In other words, self-pollination 

 involves in its broadest sense the parts 

 of one individual plant and cross-polli- 

 nation the parts of two distinct indi- 

 viduals. As the terms are used in horti- 

 culture we must still broaden these 

 definitions, for we still consider the 

 flowers of those plants commonly 

 propagated vegetatively (by cuttings, 

 layers, suckers, and by graftage) self- 

 pollinated so long as the transfer of 

 pollen does not extend beyond indi- 

 viduals of the same variety. When the 

 transfer extends beyond the variety, as 

 between a Jonathan and a Mcintosh 

 apple tree, we say il is cross-pollina- 

 tion. Bui strictly speaking horticul- 

 tural varieties which are propagated 

 vegetatively are nothing more than in- 

 dividuals. All our varieties of fruit 

 have either appeared as seedlings or 

 hud variations. In each case they were 

 single individuals to begin with and 

 propagation by division of vegetative 

 parts docs not create new individuals. 

 Two apple trees grown from buds or 

 from stems taken from the same parent 

 plant aii' no nunc unlike than two 

 branches of one plant grown from seed. 



By 0. B. Whipple, Bozeman, Montana 



The purpose of pollination is fer- 

 tilization, without which flowers are 

 rarely able to produce seed and never 

 fertile seed. But, you may say, we care 

 very little whether a pear produces 

 seeds or not. True; unless we appre- 

 ciate that most ilowers require the 

 stimulus of fertilization before they 

 will develop fruits. Among our horti- 

 cultural crops there are a few plants 

 which are able to develop fruits with- 

 out fertilization. The seedless oranges 

 as well as other seedless citrus fruits 

 and the English cucumber are familiar 

 examples in which fertilization, either 

 self or cross, is not necessary for fruit 

 production, although it is necessary for 

 the development of fertile seed. Occa- 

 sionally our common tree fruits appar- 

 ently set fruit without fertilization, but 

 these fruits are in nearly every case 

 inferior to those develpoed from fer- 

 tilized Ilowers. 



Darwin, an England writer, in a hook 

 published in 1859 first called our atten- 

 tion to the fail that in nature certain 

 plants were so organized or their Ilow- 

 ers so constructed as to invite, and, in 

 many cases, to insure cross-pollination. 

 Long before this il was commonly 

 known thai insects carried pollen from 

 Dower to flower and that cross-pollina- 

 tion was probably not uncommon in the 

 plant kingdom, but until the writings of 

 Darwin appeared il was not very defi- 

 nitely known that Hie plants profited 



by the transfer. Darwin observed that 

 among plants in nature there was a 

 tremendous struggle for existence, in 

 which many individuals perished, and 

 he naturally concluded that those best 

 fitted for this struggle survived. In 

 other words, he contended that the 

 various forms of plant life found in 

 nature were forms evolved by this com- 

 petition. If one plant had an advantage 

 over a neighbor it survived and pro- 

 duced offspring which in many cases 

 inherited the strong points of the 

 parent. He found in nature many 

 plants with blossoms so constructed as 

 to practically insure cross-pollination 

 and reasoned that where such a condi- 

 tion of affairs existed cross-fertilization 

 must be beneficial. The theory ad- 

 vanced was that plants developed from 

 seeds which were the result of cross- 

 fertilization were more vigorous than 

 those from seed of self-fertilized Ilow- 

 ers, and consequently more often sur- 

 vived in the struggle lor existence. 

 These cross-fertilized seeds no doubt 

 Came in the majority of rases from 

 plants where cross-pollination was in- 

 duced by peculiar structure of [lowers 

 or by other means, and in lime groups 

 of individuals were developed in which 

 cross-pollination was the rule rather 

 than the exception. Darwin later veri- 

 fied the theory of greater vigor in seed- 

 lings resulting from cross-fertilization 

 Continued mi page 19 



