3i6 Report of the Horticultural Department of the 



The two lots of Greening trees which were placed under the 

 second method of the experiment in 1896 show for the period 

 of three years, 1896, 1897, 1898, practically the same amount of 

 fruit fit for barreling, and in the following year their yields, 

 though not recorded in bushels, were observed to be very light 

 (p. 306). In 1896 the thinned trees produced about a bushel 

 more per tree of the first and second grades combined than the 

 unthinned trees did; in 1897 the unthinned trees averaged nearly 

 five bushels per tree more than the thinned; in 1898 the thmned 

 trees again took the lead, exceeding in yield the unthinned trees 

 by about four bushels per tree; so that for the three years the 

 total yield of first and second grade fruit was very nearly the 

 same for the two lots of trees. As was the case with the Bald- 

 win, these results do not signify that the practice of thinning 

 materially changed either the regularity or the amount of fruit 

 production. 



In the Hubbardston we have to deal with a variety which has 

 a tendency to bear more regularly than Baldwin and more 

 abundantly than Greening. Considering only first and second 

 grade fruit, we find that the total yield where the fruit was 

 thinned was 56:^ bushels for the years 1896 to 1898 and 74-^ 

 bushels for the unthinned fruit. In the following year neither 

 the thinned nor the unthinned tree bore enough fruit to give 

 opportunity for thinning, and their yields were not recorded 

 (p. 308). In this pair of trees one was constantly more productive 

 than the other. In order then to learn whether thinning tended 

 to make the yield greater or more regular the amount of the 

 thinned product should be compared year by year with the 

 amount from the unthinned tree. Disregarding the drops and 

 culls, the percentage which each tree bore of the combined yield 

 of both trees, i and 2, is shown for each year in the following 

 statement: 



Table XII. — Percentage of Thinned vs. Unthinned Hubbardston, 



