270 STATE BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



Prof. Bailey wanted to know when they were ripe, and he came over on 

 Saturday and we drove up to the orchard Sunday. The night before there 

 came up a terrible thunder shower and a big blow. We went up to the 

 orchard and when we went in three-fourths of my ripe peaches were on 

 the ground. On the three rows the ground was simply paved with peaches. 

 There were not half a dozen peaches on the ground where the ashes 

 were. There those peaches hung right through that storm, and when we 

 commenced picking that day there was quite a contrast in the baskets. 

 That has followed right straight through wherever I have applied ashes. 

 But it is possible that your soil is already rich in potash. Mine is not. 

 Ashes and bone combined give me wonderful results. As Prof. Bailey said, 

 *' Ashes are worth |150 a ton here." I would not put barnyard manure 

 in a peach orchard on any conditions if it was on soil good for anything. 

 There is such a thing as having land too rich if it is of a naturally rich 

 character. Where we get the largest growth of trees we do not always 

 get the finest fruit. 



Hale again: ''Low heading and close annual pruning for the first 

 five years." This low pruning where you are going to do so much work 

 in the tree is a great labor saving. My thinning and pruning this last 

 year took seventeen and one-half days per acre. That is a good deal of 

 work. Many men say that they cannot afford to do it, but I cannot 

 afford to not do it. 



KEEPING OUT THE BORERS. 



Mr. Hale says, "Keep out most borers with some suitable wash, and 

 dig out all others." That is good; the man who goes to washing peach 

 trees wants to know what he is doing. The country is full of monuments 

 of people's ignorance on this particular point. Mr. Hale is as good 

 authority on peach matters as there is in the United States. A few years 

 ago he published a formula for this wash. The formula is all right no 

 doubt and he used it successfully; but some of my neighbors, having very 

 fine orchards, were troubled with borers. Knowing that Mr. Hale was 

 safe authority, they washed their trees and killed them. They took it off, 

 but it was too late, the trees were killed. The men wrote him and asked 

 him if there was any mistake made in the formula, and he said no and 

 that he had used it for years. They sent to Chicago and got pure potash 

 and pure carbolic acid. This seemed to be the mistake, for he had used 

 the crude carbolic acid. That's why I say when you talk about washing 

 a tree that I want every man to think a little before he does it. The 

 peach bark is delicate in many ways. I do not use any wash; I can keep 

 the borers off by mounding up in the fall and leaving it there until about 

 the next July, and then hoe it aw^ay, and if the borer has made any start 

 take it out. ^ We know that does not do any damage. It prevents his 

 hatching around the crown of your tree. For that reason I would not 

 take his eighth commandment; but I should surely keep the borer out. 

 I hunt two or three times a year because I do not like to have them get 

 in the trees. 



