EXPERIMENT STATION WORK WITH PEACHES. 409 



dry winds of spring. Thus protected, the trees blossomed later, 

 remained in bloom longer, and set much more fruit than any other 

 trees of the same varieties in the orchard. The sheds were left over 

 the trees until the middle of May. Practically no fruit dropped 

 from the protected trees, while a good deal dropped from the unpro- 

 tected ones. The cost for lumber was about $2 per tree, and the cost 

 of building and taking down the sheds 80 cents. 



The use of such materials sprayed on peach trees as glue, turpen- 

 tine and benzine, benzine and rosin, benzine and hard-oil finish, lin- 

 seed oil and turpentine, shellac, etc., proved of no benefit whatever 

 as a winter protection at the Massachusetts Hatch Station, " while 

 materials containing turpentine and benzine killed the trees. At that 

 station also, ** where the winter temperature varies from —16° to 

 — 28° F., bending over the trees and protecting with mats or other 

 light coverings of moss or pine boughs prevented the destruction of 

 the buds, and the treatment did not injure the trees. 



CAUSES OF WINTER INJURY IN PEACH ORCHARDS. 



Great losses are suffered in peach orchards during what are known 

 as test wdnters. The prolonged winter of 1903-4 resulted in great 

 losses by orchardists in the Lake Erie peach belt of Ohio. Some 

 orchards were entirely destroyed, others were apparently uninjured, 

 and still others, while sufi^ering severely, yet contained sections, rows, 

 or parts of rows, or individual trees that came through the winter 

 uninjured. A careful study of affected orchards by the Ohio Station " 

 showed that while the general or direct cause of the injury" was, of 

 course, the severe and long continued cold, the specific causes of the 

 varying degrees of injury were many. 



Of course, some varieties of peaches are much more susceptible to 

 injur}^ from cold than others, and during a specially severe winter 

 these will naturally suffer most. Aside from these losses, however, 

 many additional losses occurred among the hardiest varieties. The 

 causes of the injury in different orchards and of the varying degrees 

 of injury in the same orchards were found to be exceedmgl}" numer- 

 ous. Generally speaking, wherever the vitality of the tree or orchard 

 had been lowered by any cause whatever during its previous history, 

 the chances of injury to the tree by cold were so much increased. 

 Thus, trees in low vitality, due to lack of fertilit}^ or poor physical 

 condition of the soil, trees weakened by attacks of San Jose scale, leaf 

 curl, borers, etc., an extremely dry condition of th6 ground, very wet 

 soils, trees on poor soils, especially soils lacking in humus, were in 

 every case the ones most seriously injured by the unusually severe 

 winter. 



a Massachusetts Hatch Sta. Rpt. 1888, p. 15. cOhio Sta. Bui. 157. 



b Massachusetts Hatch Sta. Bui. 17. 



