INFLUENCE OF HEAT AND DROUTH ON TUEE«. 65 



that cause alone. When we bee vegetation fading under the summer sun 

 we naturally think that lack of water is the cause and begin at once to 

 apply this apparently needed remedy. It is quite apt to be the case that 

 water will help relieve such plants from their distress, but let us study 

 the conditions and see if water is the only panacea for such affected veg- 

 etation. 



Plants and animals are much alike in their thirst for water. Both 

 classes have a longing for water in warm weather because it helps us to 

 keep cool. When an animal is sick from any cause, it has a desire to 

 get in Ihe shade and have water also, for quieting his fever. 



Freshly planted trees or plants are in very much the same condition 

 as a sick animal. With their roots torn loose and partially cut away, 

 their tops also more or less mutilated, they are fit subjects for a hospital. 

 Now animals, when wounded and bleeding, will seek shelter from the 

 heat of the sun. Trees in a like condition have a low vitality, their cir- 

 culation (the flowing sap) is very low, their foliage which might be used 

 for their own shelter under normal conditions is insufficient, and they 

 are left to swelter and suffer in the broiling sun. 



You and I can crawl under the shade of a friendly tree when the 

 mercury is climbing up around the hundred mark, but the helpless inani- 

 mate tree must endure the burden and heat of the day without recourse 

 to shelter. The season of 1911 was noted here as elsewhere as a very 

 remarkable one in its extremes of both heat and drouth. Tree planters 

 lost very heavily of their newly planted trees and shrubs despite the 

 amount of water that was given them. Out of several plantings that I 

 made in which the tree trunks were wrapped with burlap, and the roots 

 protected by mulching, I lost but a very small per cent. These trees re- 

 ceived a normal amount of water, but I know of some trees planted under 

 similar conditions that were lost despite a free application of water. 



Such instances as the above, coupled with observations in a general 

 way, lead me to the conviction that the excessive heat of the past summer 

 was responsible for a much larger damage to vegetation than was the 

 lack of moisture, even tho there w;is a serious need for this moisture. 



The effect of the heat upon the blackberry crop was very marked in 

 several cases that cajne under my observation. In a plantation of three 

 or four acres near Lincoln, coarse manure and straw hadi been used to 

 mulch all but a small portion of the patch. Strange to say, but it was 

 true, that the portion that was mulched was nearly ruined by the heat, 

 the berries drying up before attaining their first stage of ripening. On 

 the small part that was not mulched, and not even cultivated, there were 

 several cases of berries that came to a fair degree of maturity. The 

 owner came to the conclusion that the reflection of the sun from the 

 mulching being cast upwards against the growing berries was the cause 

 of their premature drying. The same relative influence of the heat upon 

 the ripening berries in my own: plantation was noticeable to a limited 

 extent. My plantation was young and the mulching not heavy, but the 



