464 



CULTURK OK TKNDKR FRUITS IS COLD CLIMATES. 



or not dill' ill fifty escaped, and one-half of 

 the younc: branches were often killed. 

 Learning the cause, the trees were removed 

 to an adjacent elevation fifty feet higher, 

 when the difficulty was at once obviated. 



In tiie winter of 1S45-6, when the seve- 

 rity of cold on a clear night sunk the ther- 

 mometer several degrees below zero, after 

 the peach buds had been swelled by a few 

 warm days, trees which stood on a hill thirty 

 feet higher than the neighboring creek val- 

 ley, lost nine-tenths of their blossonis„while 

 on another hill twenty-feet still higher, 

 nine-tenths escaped. The lake of cold air 

 which covered the smaller hill, did not reach 

 the top of the larger. 



In a large portion of the State of New- 

 York, more especially in the region of the 

 southern tier of counties, nearly all attempts 

 to raise the tender fruits appear to have 

 been relinquished. The inhabitants of the 

 larger villages and their vicinity, places 

 mostly situated at the bottoms of deep val- 

 leys, being persons of more enterprize and 

 means, have tried the experiment — and for 

 obvious causes have failed — and hence the 

 conclusion that the climate was necessarily 

 fatal. But there is strong reason to believe, 

 that through all the southern counties of New- 

 York, extendiiig Jroin Lake Erie to the Had- 

 son, peaches may he raised with liLtle diffi- 

 culty, by a proper selection of locality, and 

 by an observance of the principles already 

 pointed out ; — that is, by selecting elevated 

 spots, and dry and firm soils, and avoiding 

 mucky ground in valleys. In the town of 

 Spencer in Tioga county, N. Y., near the 

 head of Cayuga inlet, peaches have with- 

 stood the climate and done well, at an ele- 

 vation of 700 feet above Cayuga lake. A 

 striking instance was shown the writer last 

 summer in Cohocton, Steuben county. 

 The river valley in that town, though many 



hundred feet above the level of the sea, is 

 much lower than the surrounding country, 

 being flanked by hills about 500 feet high. 

 In the valley, the peach can not be culti- 

 vated, the trees having been completely 

 killed to the ground, in winter. But on one 

 of the neighboring hills, 500 feet above, 

 and probably 1200 feet above the sea, an 

 orchard has been planted on good soil, 

 which entirely escapes, and yields regular 

 crops of fruit. In the northeastern part of 

 Pennsylvania, probably twelve or fifteen 

 hundred feet above the level of the ocean, 

 in the summer of 1835, after one of the se- 

 verest winters for twenty years, the only 

 two peach trees observed in traveling many 

 miles, were full of peaches ; while the same 

 winter, in Stroudsburg valley, a large tree 

 was noticed killed down to the ground. 

 While those hills are often covered with 

 snow throughout the winter, the valleys are 

 subjected, to thaws, and hence become more 

 unfavorable to tender vegetation. 



Most of these cases show the great ad- 

 vantages of elevated sites. A dry and firm 

 soil is, however, quite important. The in- 

 fluence of a compact knoll, rising scarcely 

 above the rest of the field, has saved the 

 corn which grew upon it ; while on the 

 more mucky and spongy portions of the 

 rest of the field, radiating heat more freely, 

 the crop has been destroyed. A successful 

 cultivator of drained swamps, told me he 

 could never plant such lands with corn 

 safely till two or three weeks after the usual 

 time of planting in common soils on an 

 equal level. These influences apply with 

 greater force to tender trees. Succulence 

 and lateness of growth, caused by such soils, 

 are always unfavorable to the endurance of 

 cold ; while a hard, dry soil, at the same 

 time that it produces a less rapid growth, 

 causes also an earlier cessation, and the 

 young wood becomes matured and harden- 



