Grass and Cultivation, 311 



Pear on tlie Thorn, Imported vs. American Pear Stock. 



BY B. A. MATHEWS, KNOXVILLE, IOWA. 



ED. Western Horticulturist: — In regard to Bartlett and F. Beauty, on the 

 White Thorn, I have quite a number of fine, large trees of each sort. Some of 

 them are grafted into the limbs of large thorn trees, others again I sawed off five or 

 six feet from the ground and then grafted the new shoots. I have ascertained that 

 they should, by all means, be allowed to grow two years after being sawed ofi" in 

 this way, in order to obtain vigor and thriftiness, otherwise the stock is apt to fail 

 sooner or later, thus, of course, killing the entire tree. Again, by keeping the 

 Thorn tree closely pruned, after grafting in the limbs, it will die. Again, one or 

 more limbs of the Thorn may fail from too close pruning, thus giving the appearance 

 of blight. Some, perhaps, without investigating, would think it was blight, still I 

 am satisfied I have had more or less limbs on my trees to die of blight. When 

 blight attacks a limb it docs not, necessarily, injure the tree much, merely confines 

 its ravages to that particular limb, descending only till it comes to the Thorn stock ; 

 it can then be removed without damaging the rest of the tree. I have not thus far 

 been damaged any of consequence by blight. 



Tf I had known many little things when I commenced grafting on this stock that 

 I know now, I could have many more trees than I have ; for instance — experiment- 

 ing with fifty or more varieties, but few of which would do on the Thorn ; grafting 

 many others the first year after sawing off; keeping others too closely pruned, not 

 allowing them leaves enough to elaborate the sap thrown into the tops of the trees, 

 thus killing them out. In this way many valuable stocks were lost, and much labor 

 and expense incurred that I could avoid now. I would not graft but very few 

 varieties of the Thorn out of all I have tested. 



In orchard nearly all my trees arc on Pear stocks, imported from France. Would 

 have no trees on American stocks. This idea might not be popular among some 

 nurserymen, but I notice some of the leading American nurserymen are advertising 

 trees on foreign stocks for sale this fall, Hanford, of Columbus, Ohio, among the 

 number. He has found out that he can raise trees successfully on no other stock. 

 M. B. Bateham, his predecessor, tried many years to raise Pear trees, and expended 

 thousands of dollars without accomplishing anything. The point, though, is not 

 simply to raise trees in nursery, but in orchard. 



I have never yet seen a sound and perfect American Pear stock, while foreio^n 

 ones are as pure as could be desired. No nicer trees can be raised than may be 

 grown on Mountaiu Ash, but what are they worth ? 



I believe in Anger^s Quince for dwarfs. No other Quince will answer. For stand- 

 ard imported Pear stock, no other Pear seedlings for me. It might be well to 



experiment with Mountain Ash, Thorn, Juneberry. etc., much might be learned by it. 



— — — ♦-• 



Grass and Cultivation. — Mr. W. Parker, Vinton, writes us: "There are 



some things in my observations among the orchards in this region inexplicable. One 



orchard in cultivation is badly injured, another near by in grass not damaged — another 



orchard under the best of cultivation in perfect condition, and a neighboring orchard 



in grass badly killed out." Who can reconcile these strange results of grass and 



culture ? 



