GARDEN EXPERIMENTS. 209 



Mr. C. E. Oberg: I would like to ask the gentleman who read 

 the paper what makes him think that he will get better results 

 with his potatoes when planting medium sized seed than he 

 would from planting larger seed, 



Mr. Bacheller : I don't know whether my ideas are correct, 

 but my first idea was that planting the large potato we would 

 have more eyes than from a small potato, but this may not be 

 true. It may be the eyes are there all the same ; I may be wrong 

 in that. My impression is that a medium sized potato is better, 

 and I could plant a greater acreage with medium sized potatoes. 

 Cutting one or two eyes to the piece we get a good sized piece 

 of seed, while a small potato we could not cut to advantage. I do 

 not know that I can give any other reason than that. 



PRUNING. 



(A Discussion.) 



Mr. O. F. Brand: Two years ago when this subject was dis- 

 cussed I stood alone in my position with reference to the time of 

 pruning, and two years more of observation have only confirmed 

 me in my belief that I was correct. The idea of pruning in March 

 came from necessity and convenience, in the same way that a 

 whole lot of our habits originate. It used to be convenient for 

 men to prune their trees in the latter part of March, because there 

 was nothing else to do at that time of the year, but at other times 

 of the year their work was driving thenn and they had not the 

 time. One man goes along and sees another man pruning his trees, 

 and he does not ask the reason why he does that work at that 

 particular time, but he goes home and prunes his own simply be- 

 cause he saw a man in whose judgment he perhaps has the fullest 

 confidence pruning his trees ; and in that way it became the 

 custom to do the pruning at that time of the year. My reasons 

 for September or October pruning are these : The tree has ripened 

 itself then. It has stored away within itself the food — especially 

 in October, and generally in September — the food that is neces- 

 sary to carry it through the winter. Everything lives on food, 

 plants as well as animals, and the tree has to store up food in the 

 summer time for use in the winter and to start a new growth in 

 the spring. Now, the new growth begins a great deal earlier 

 than you have any idea it does. Chemical analysis has proven 

 that there is a great deal of aqueous matter in the tree in January, 

 and there is a great deal more of it the first of March. There will 

 be a great deal more of aqueous matter, of water sap, in the tree 

 in March than in January, and in the fore part of March the work 

 of preparing for summer growth has already commenced in the 

 tree. 



Now, I will go back and give an illustration of how nature 

 works. A few years ago we had a very wet April and May. In 

 one of our parks in Faribault, which has an alluvial soil under- 

 laid with sand and gravel, there were planted a good many soft 

 maple trees, and, as a result of that large amount of moisture, they 



