164 MINNESOTA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 
bushels per acre, why can we not grow four acres at the same rate? We 
can. Produce the same conditions over the four acres as existed on the four 
tods, and the desired crop will be at hand at the time of harvest. To accom- 
plish this, study the conditions while the crop is growing. Notice the lay 
of the land, the fertility, the subsoil, the drainage. How deep did you plow? 
Did you turn up subsoil? Is there a fine, soft seed bed for the young plants 
to get started in? Is there enough depth of loose soil to allow the roots 
to get down to water if it is a dry season? Is there enough drainage to 
allow the roots to get down if it is a wet season? Let me emphasize the 
point of drainage, as this is more likely than any other point to be the cause 
of the partial failure of the crop. It is not enough that you open ditches 
and drain off all surplus water after it has accumulated; it should be done 
before the seed is planted. Under-draining gives much the best results. 
There is much more in mechanical conditions than we are sometimes willing 
to admit. 
If I have thrown out some hints that will prompt to more careful study 
and more earnest, intelligent effort to comprehend nature, my object will 
have been attained. 
TOP-WORKING. 
CHAS. G. PATTEN, CHARLES CITY, IA. 
Marshall P. Wilder once said, ““When we have attained an exact knowl- 
edge of the adaptation of the stock to the graft, that will be the perfection 
of culture.” 
In the above quotation Mr. Wilder very aptly expresses the thought 
that has no doubt impressed itself upon the mind of every one who has in- 
vestigated this subject to any considerable extent, that beyond and above 
any mechanical knowledge or adjustment of scion and stock, there is an un- 
definable element in plants, as well as in animal life, that fits one for the 
other in varying degrees, and could we adjust it for the highest results we 
would come near perfection. This is a work for the experiment stations. 
It is too expensive and almost too subtle for the general experimenter. 
Time and a large number of trials must be had to meet the requirements. 
of this work. That there is great value in it, I do not doubt. 
There is a principle in it that has been little heeded or understood. Why 
is a given tree or plant adapted or unadapted to the other in the families or 
species to which they mutually belong? And why is it that two species, like 
our cultivated apple and the Siberian crab and its hybrids, in some cases 
utterly fail to unite the cell growth? That they will not we know; that there 
is a cause for it we cannot doubt. A microscopic examination of the cells 
of the two trees might and probably would reveal one reason and perhaps 
the only practical one; but the life element that seems almost akin to the 
affinities of the human soul will doubtless never be fathomed. 
The putting together of the scion and the graft often unites two seem- 
ingly opposing forces, and we call it the “influence of scion and graft,” and 
the practical point for us to determine is the equilibrium of influence. In 
other words, how much of the stock of a given variety will allow the graft 
of another given variety to have an equal balance of influence in the growth 
and development of the combined tree? This vital factor in the work of 
top-grafting, as before suggested, has been little thought of. 
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