230 



MINNESOTA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



yond dispute at the Nebraska Experiment Station. In regions of 

 very scanty fall rains, the late summer cover crop may be found to 

 leave the ground too dry during winter, but at the Nebraska Station 

 the ground under the cover has held more moisture during the win- 

 ter than bare ground. In short, where hardiness is of prime impor- 

 tance, we must be content with a rather slow, well matured growth. 

 There is one other point in connection with this matter that I 

 would call your attention to, not because we can make any use of it 

 but, rather, on account of the fact that it is really an obstacle to our 

 efforts. I refer to the relation between early maturing of wood and 

 early ripening of fruit in apples. You horticulturists of Minnesota 

 are leading the world in the effort to produce a hardy, late-keeping 

 winter apple. Your effort is worthy of success, and it is to be hoped 

 that you will succeed early in accomplishing what you have under- 



Peach twigs showing (1) severe winter injury whiere given late fall cultivation, 

 and (2) very slight injury where a cover-crop was grown the fall before. 



taken". The result you are striving after will be of the greatest value, 

 not only to Minnesota but to the whole northwest. It should not, 

 and I am sure will not, discourage you to hear me say that you have 

 an extremely difficult problem. It will help you rather than hinder, 

 it seems to me, to understand beforehand the difficulty to be over- 

 come. You know it is difficult to get a hardy, late-keeping apple. 

 If this were not true, we should have had apples of that sort long 

 ago, and it would not now be necessary for your society to offer a 

 thousand-dollar prize for such an apple. But why is it not just as 

 easy to produce a hardy late apple as a hardy early one ? It is simp- 

 ly because there is a sort of correlation in apples between early ri- 

 pening of fruit, with accompanying poor keeping qualities, on the 



