230 ANNUAL REPORT 



life, you will see the boys and girls before you anxious for informa- 

 tion; then it will be that your orchards will prosper, and horticul- 

 turists will have no cause to wonder who will take their places 

 in these meetings when they are called to rest. It would afford 

 me rauch more pleasure to give a son of mine a dollar to become a 

 member of some Horticultural Society than to attend a dance, or 

 as friend Gideon would say, a horse race. 



I find it almost impossible now to find a boy or young man 

 that has any desire to learn how to care for apple trees. They have 

 been educated to think that it is throwing away their time. This I 

 hope will be changed. In this essay I have treated almost exclus- 

 ively on an apple orchard, for the reason that peaches or pears can- 

 not be raised in this climate profitably. Plums I have mentioned a 

 few, and if you cannot procure the kinds I recommended then set 

 the native or wild ones. There is more I would like to say, but 

 this essay is already too long, and will close by saying do not falter 

 or give up orcharding in Minnesota, but select the best localities 

 you have, set the best trees you can buy, take care of them as I 

 have directed, feed and nourish them, screen the trunk from heat 

 of sun, ravages of animals and birds, visit them often, forming the 

 acquaintance of each one, they will remind you of something in 

 their history or their propagator. Prune when needed while 

 young, and I believe a kind and beneficent Providence will reward 

 your efforts with an abundance of fruit and you will always enjoy 

 the fatisfactionof knowing that your labors have been rewarded, 

 and have the pleasant assurance that you have accomplished a 

 great and lasting good for yourself and posterity. 



ORCHARDING IN MINNESOTA. 



By Gko. J. Kei.logg, Janesville, Wis. 



The best site for an orchard is the highest ground at command ; 

 first choice, a northeastern slope ; second, a northern slope border- 

 ing upon a lake or river, high enough to give a free circulation of 

 air, thereby preventing frost, blight and mildew. Avoid high 

 wind-breaks or bluffs on the east and north sides, and nothing on 

 any side above fifteen or twenty feet, which may protect in a high 



