fHE winter of 1853-4 -will be remembered in many parts of the country, as 

 having been remarkably disastrous to Pears on Quince stocks. Large numbers 

 of trees were totally lost, and many others were very seriously injured ; so much so, 

 that they continued to die off at intervals during the early part of the summer. These 

 injuries were experienced throughout a large portion of this State, — in some localities 

 more severely than in others. They extended westward to Michigan, and in some 

 parts of that State were very great. Such an unprecedented loss, felt simultaneously 

 in several sections and States, could scarcely fail to create alarm; and what we may 

 call a panic actually did prevail for a short time.' Newspapers and individuals hastily, 

 without for a moment investigating the causes which led to the disaster, pronounced 

 the Quince stock unadapted to our climate ; declared that it should be abandoned ; 

 and that we must, as in former times, place our reliance on Pear stocks. Persons who 

 had recently made large investments in orchards of dwarf Pear trees, others who 

 contemplated such investments, and many of those who had planted fruit gardens, 

 and those who were about to plant, made anxious inquiry on the subject ; and not a 

 few whose apprehensions were most strongly awakened, set at once about planting 

 Pears on Pear stocks, to take the place of those on the Quince. 



Now we propose to show that there are not, nor were, any real grounds for 

 alarm ; and also to suggest some means of preventing a recurrence of injuries from 

 the same causes. That there was no real cause for alarm, we assume simply on the 

 ground that such a disaster had not occurred before in this country. We suffered 

 seriously around Rochester, — quite as seriously, perhaps, as in any other locality, — 

 and yet, during our experience of fifteen years engaged in extensive cultivation, we do 

 not remember having lost a single Pear tree on Quince, on account of the Quince 

 having suffered from the effects of winter. During that period we have experienced 

 one or more winters of such intense severity that the " oldest inhabitant" could not 

 remember an equal ; yet out of hundreds of thousands of young Quince stocks, 

 standing in exposed nursery rows, and of acres of trees of various ages from one to 

 ten years, we are not aware of having lost one from the effects of the winter upon 

 the stock, up to the disastrous period of which we write. Indeed, we have often taken 

 occasion to remark, that the nurserymen and fruit growers of this country had great 

 reason to be thankful to Him who rules the seasons, for their favored exemption from 

 those oft recurring periodical calamities experienced in other countries, from extraor- 

 dinary degrees of cold, and other destructive phenomena. 



Who has not heard of the destruction of whole Orange plantations in the South, 

 and even in Italy, from extreme cold. In various parts of Europe, we hear of trees 

 and shrubs, usually quite hardy, totally cut down over wide spread sections of country, 

 from some unusual or unseasonable cold. No longer ago than last spring, the whole 

 fruit crop was cut off in most parts of England and Scotland, and thousands of young 



December 1 1851. l 1 Iso. XLL 



