CENTRAL TRIAL STATION. 45 
very best named sorts, and largely from hand-made crosses between the 
Duchess and Hibernal and the Charlamoff and Hibernal. 
The winter killing of roots of apple trees last winter has led to much dis 
cussion as to the importance of getting hardy stocks for them, and just at 
present interest seems to center around Pyrus baccata seedlings. To throw 
light on this subject we have grown three varieties of this crab. One is no 
larger than a medium sized green pea, with a very long slender stem. It is, 
however, quite productive, and the tree is a good, vigorous grower, and, so 
far, is free from blight. The seed, however, does not grow as freely as it is 
desired. This variety is, I think, what is sometimes known as P. prunifolia. 
We have also a yellow Siberian and a red Siberian. These have fruits much 
smaller than the common red and yellow Siberian. One of these trees seems 
PYRUS BACCATA. VALUABLE FOR HARDY SEEDLING ROOTS. 
inclined to blight, but the other is, so far, entirely free from it, although the 
branches of the two interlock. Each produces an enormous amount of fruit 
regularly each year, which might be of some value for preserving, but it is 
rather too small for general use for this purpose. Our interest in this as a 
stock, it seems to me, centers around the fact of its being very hardy, of 
fairly vigorous growth, and in the important additional fact that it produces 
a large amount of seed, which grows with great certainty. I think these 
latter are the most promising of anything that we have for stocks. We have 
sent out about 1,500 of these seedlings for trial to nurserymen and orchard- 
ists the past year. 
PEARS.—We have been trying for many years to get a variety of the 
pear that will be of value here, and we have thought that if we could secure a 
