456 MINNESOTA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



I have mentioned is kept in place. This has been proved as effective 

 as an)- of the contrivances made of lath and wire, costs less and is 

 easily applied. This man reports success, the one who neglects 

 these things reports failure. 



What varieties of apples and other fruits shall we plant? In reply 

 I would say, that if you want to be on the safe side and do not wish 

 to enter on the line of experimental work, plant such varieties aa 

 are recommended by your state society and such kinds as you know 

 are doing well in your locality. 



The people of Austin are favored, in that they are at no great dis- 

 tance from two of the best experiment stations in your state, that 

 of E. H. S. Dartt, of Owatonna, and Clarence Wedge, of Albert Lea, 

 the efficient secretary of this society. Mr. Dartt, has eight hundred 

 varieties of the apple grafted, besides a large number of ungrafted 

 seedlings. Look up his reports and see what he says about them. 



Last winter, while this society was in session at Albert Lea, a gang 

 of agents were at work in the city and its suburbs taking orders for 

 nursery stock, at prices three or four times as high as the same or bet- 

 ter stock could have been procured for from the home nursery there. 

 The said agents were from Illinois, and I am reliably informed that 

 they sold several thousand dollars worth of stock in that vicinity. 

 One thing is certain, they did not sell anything to a live, active 

 member of your society. 



It is an obvious fact that the class of men who bite at these baits 

 offered by the aforesaid agents are those who do not read our horti- 

 cultural reports, and they also belong to that class who are not 

 patriotic enough to patronize their home institutions. 



There are, no doubt, hundreds of seedling apple trees that have 

 been produced during the past twelve or fifteen years that will 

 in the future prove very valuable, and some of them, I have no 

 doubt, will eclipse anything known. 



At many of our experiment stations the work of cross-fertilization 

 has been carried on to a very great extent, and crosses have been 

 obtained of all our most valuable varieties, including the best of 

 foreign sorts that have been imported from Russia and other coun- 

 tries. This work of hybridizing has produced crosses, the trees of 

 which will, in my opinion, in the near future, produce results that 

 will astonish the fruit growers of the northwest. 



It is not to be expected that every one who attempts to grow fruit 

 will be successful, any more than that all will succeed in any other 

 business, still it must be admitted that the growing of the leading 

 varieties of fruit offers as wide and safe a field for enterprise as is 

 to be found in any other branch of business pertaining to the cul- 

 tivation of the soil. Those who imagine that all that is required is 

 to obtain the plants and see that they are planted, after which they 

 can sit down and wait for a bountiful harvest, will be disappointed. 

 That class of people, it matters not what they undertake, are sure to 

 be unfortunate, and every experiment will end in failure until they 

 learn to labor as well as to wait. Profitable fruit culture cannot re- 

 sult from idleness or negligence. Prompt, energetic action applied 

 at the right time is essential to success. 



