Page 20 



BETTER FRUIT 



August 



THE SOUTHERN 

 GATEWAY 



BALTIMORE 



Our locatioD and facilities are in the 4A class. 



We have also reservations in a new Cold Storage House for a number of cars 

 of Box Apples — on which a liberal cash advance will be made. 



lo^'I^ir^ouse- F. BORDER'S SON CO. 



fruit during tiie ofT year. Tlie trees so 

 treated usually bear some fruit the ofT 

 year, but seldom a satisfactory crop. 

 Nor is the matter one of food supply. 

 Orchards amply supplied with food are 

 not always annual bearers. Peculiari- 

 ties of the season have something to do 

 with alternate bearing, but do not 

 wholly account for it. Eliminating all 

 the above conditions — admitting, how- 

 ever, that all have some influence on 

 the bearing habit — we must conclude 

 that the biennial bearing habit of 

 apples is a peculiarity of the species. 

 Good cultivation, an ample supply of 

 food at all times, careful attention to 

 pruning and training, proper control of 

 pests and systematic thinning are all 

 means which can be used to some ex- 

 tent to circumvent nature. 



Leaving novt- the formation of fruit 

 buds, let us see what can be done to 

 control the development of fruit buds. 

 Blooming, the prelude of fruiting, had 

 little significance to the fruit grower 

 until the discovery was made that 

 many varieties of several fruits were 

 unable to fertilize themselves and that 

 failures of fruit crops were often due 

 to the planting of infertile varieties. 

 The knowledge obtained by experi- 

 menters in this field has to some degree 

 modified the planting of all orchard 

 fruits. Pollination and fertilization are 

 events which take place in blossoms 

 that must be reckoned with by fruit 

 growers. 



It is necessary to distinguish between 

 pollination and fertilization, terms sup- 

 posed by many to have the same mean- 



FOR THE PRACTICAL 

 ORCHARDIST 



The Tosch Nailing Bench 



For accuracy and speed and a well finished, 

 durable box, its use is recommended by the 

 leading- orchardists of the Northwest. 



Price, $15.00, Complete 



f.o.b. Cashmere or North Yakima, Wash. 



AGENTS WANTED 

 Detailed information from 



Tosch Manufacturing Co. 



CASHMBRE, WASH. 



The Biggest Apple Dealers 

 in California 



WRITE OR WIRE US FOR DETAILED 

 MARKET INFORMATION 



A. LEVY & J. ZENTNER CO. 



Davis Street (fromwastiingtontooregonsts.) San Francisco, California 



ing. Pollination is the dusting of the 

 stigma, the female organ of a flower, 

 with pollen, the male element. Fertili- 

 zation is the process in which the male 

 cell unites with the female cell. Ferti- 

 lization takes place only after pollina- 

 tion, but a flower may, of course, be 

 pollinated and fertilization not take 

 place, a fact always to be remembered. 

 Fruits set and develop, for most part, 

 only after fertilization. The young 

 fruits when first formed have but a 

 slight hold upon life. Unfavorable 

 influences, no matter how slight, may 

 cause them to perish. Fertilization 

 gives the tiny fruit life, and enables it 

 to hold upon the parent plant through 

 nourishment drawn to supply the 

 embryo which has been formed in the 

 seeds. Thus fertilization usually, not 

 always, determines whether a fruit is 

 to develop or to drop. Shortly after 

 blooming time we have the fruit 

 "drop," resulting for most part from a 

 lack of fertilization. 



Fertilization, however, does not in- 

 sure the complete development of fruit. 

 Even after a perfect union of male and 

 female cells, so far as it can be deter- 

 mined, much fruit drops in every 

 orchard and without regard to whether 

 the trees bear few or many blossoms. 

 Crops of many varieties of several 

 fruits do not set because of the infer- 

 tility of the blossoms — that is, with 

 many fruits pollen may be produced 

 in abundance, seemingly perfect in 

 ai)pearance, and potent on the pistils 

 of other varieties, but which may 

 wholly fail to fertilize the ovaries of 

 the variety from which it came. There 

 is a great difference in the (luantity of 

 l)ollen jjidduced by the varieties of the 

 several fruits, but it is doubtful if in- 

 sufliciency of pollen is a factor of much 

 importance in the failure of trees to set 

 fruits. Varieties that do not set fruits 

 often have ;d)normal or abortive pistils 

 or stamens. A high percentage of 

 abnormal flowers nearly always indi- 

 cates a weakness in fruit setting. An- 

 other cause of the failure to set fruits 

 is the difference in time of maturity of 

 stamens and pistils. When these organs 

 do not mature at nearly the same time, 

 fruits do not set unless pollen is sup- 

 plied from some other source. The 

 female organs of fruits are receptive, 

 however, for several days, and the pol- 

 len is not shed at once from all antliers 



