STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 211 



PRIZE ESSAYS. 



The following essays, offered in competition for the society's 

 prize of twenty-five dollars for the best essay on orcharding in 

 Minnesota, having been referred to the committee of award, were 

 returned to the Secretary on the 2d of March, with intructions to 

 pridt them, and with the information that the committee would 

 defer the award until after the appearance of the essays in the 

 report. 



ORCHARDING IN MINNESOTA. 



By R. p. Speek, of Cedar Falls, Iowa. 



When I reflect for a moment that our climate is remarkably 

 severe; that our soils are not adapted to the growth of fruit trees, 

 and that it is only a few years since Minnesota and northern Iowa 

 were occupied exclusively by the Indians and wild beasts, I am 

 not surprised at the great number of our failures, but at our suc- 

 cesses in fruit culture. 



Although we cannot grow the varieties of the different kinds of 

 fruits which are valued most highly in many of the other States, yet 

 a sufficient number of varieties of the apple, grape, etc., have proved 

 healthy and productive after our severest winters, to dispel all 

 doubts in regard to what may be accomplished by the "breeding" 

 of seedling fruits intelligently upon a large scale, or by the impor- 



