HOW TO PROTECT YOUNG TREES. 243 



not«o bad as wheat, but it likewise should not be allowed to come within 

 several feet of the young tree. Corn takes from the soil an immense amount 

 of moisture as well as considerable plant food, and hence is especially 

 dangerous to the young tree. A single, well grown tree may be worth 

 several acres of corn, so that it is poor economy to seriously endanger the 

 future welfare of the newly set orchard for one or two crops of grain. 



Other crops' are better. Potatoes make an excellent crop for the 

 young orchard. Their cultivation is just what the trees need; they do 

 not remove from the soil so much plant food as the grain crop, and they 

 leave the soil loose and in excellent condition. Early potatoes especially 

 may come off in time to allow the putting in of a cover crop for winter 

 protection. 



Market garden crops in general, hoed crops, vegetables and the like 

 are the best class of crops for growing in the young orchard. It is seldom 

 that the orchard soil is rich enough to be most profitable for the intensive 

 cropping of the gardener, however, and only occasionally that the right 

 local conditions as to soil, markets, men, etc., meet to make gardening in 

 the young orchard a practicable proposition. The scheme has many good 

 things about it, though, and is sometimes worked out very nicely. 



The small fruits are sometimes grown between the trees while the 

 orchard is young. Of the small fruits the strawberry is probably better 

 adapted for this purpose than any other. It is a low grower, requires cul- 

 tivation the first season, is mulched during the winter (the mulch having 

 practically the same effect in the orchard as a good cover crop would 

 have) ; the bed runs out in a couple of years or so, and so is likely to be 

 out of the way by the time the trees need the soil, and altogether has 

 many factors to commend it. Sometimes the bush fruits are grown in the 

 young orchard. The plan can be made successful with the right local con- 

 ditions, and above all with the right man to run it, but is not to be espe- 

 cially recommended as a general proposition. 



HOW TO PROTECT YOUNG TREES. 

 By O. K. White. 

 College Extension Horticulturist of Michigan Agricultural College, 



Very often when spring approaches and the snow goes away, fruit 

 growers find many of their young trees have been seriously injured — the 

 bark has been gnawed off the trunk half, two-thirds, or entirely around. 

 This may have been done by mice, rabbits, muskrats, or some other 

 rodents. Such injuries usually occur during long, hard winters, when 

 the snow is unusually deep and the animals have difficulty in finding 

 plenty of food, and they fall upon the bark of these trees as a last re- 

 sort to satisfy their appetites. 



A great many young orchards have been planted in the last few 

 years adjacent to wood lots or cut over lands where rabbits abound. 

 Others have been allowed to gi'ow up to grass and weeds, where mice may 

 have become numerous; and others have been planted near swamps or 



