262 MINNESOTA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



yesterday. There is some criticism in regard to this seedling 

 apple, and the committee wants to be placed right. I have watched 

 very carefully the reading of this paper. There seems to be a 

 missing link between the time these scions left Mr. Wilfert and 

 the time those trees were received back and planted, and there is 

 such a great similarity between this seedling and Plumb Cider that 

 we have taken all the pains possible to get all the expert informa- 

 tion obtainable in regard to this apple that is on exhibition. Mr. 

 Patten is very well acquainted with the Plumb Cider, Mr. Yahnke 

 worked for Mr. Plumb during the time this apple was propagated 

 and is therefore quite familiar with it, and there are others here that 

 are pretty familiar with Plumb Cider; and comparing Plumb Cider 

 with this apple in seed, flesh and the formation of the calyx — and by 

 the way, Prof. Hansen is authority in the study of the calyx — if 

 this seedling is not the same, something has been reproduced 

 identical with the Plumb Cider. We did not want to misjudge this 

 apple, and we thought it was necessary to make this explanation 

 so that as far as this committee and the horticultural society as a 

 whole is concerned we should go on record in the right spirit. 



Mr. Wilfert: I will offer to furnish all the scions that any one 

 wants and let them graft those scions and the Plumb Cider on 

 the same tree or close together, and then probably they, can under- 

 stand the difference. I have found trees that have apples, and there 

 were three or four of the apples here yesterday, that look just 

 exactly like mine, but when you come to examine it closely the 

 tree looks like the Minnesota, and mine looks like the Duchess. 

 There are probably some of the members here who are familiar 

 with the Plumb Cider and can tell me what the foliage of that 

 tree looks like. Mine is a very large leaf, a thick, very rough leaf. 



Mr. O. F. Brand: I have grown and fruited the Plumb Cider 

 for a number of years. I thought I knew the Plumb Cider, and I 

 drove over to Mr. Wilfert's place to see the trees and to see and 

 judge the apples, and it never entered my mind that it was the 

 Plumb Cider. The trees do not look alike, and the apple does 

 not at all suggest to me that it might be the Plumb Cider. 



Prof. Hansen: It happens the same way with new melons. 

 For instance, some one in some other state a thousand miles dis- 

 tant originates a new melon, and some one here originates a 

 melon exactly like it. The first man gets his on the market first, 

 and the second man a year or two afterwards ; and it often happens 

 that the second man is too late in getting his seed on the market 

 because his fruit so closely resembles that of the first man, and it 

 is regarded as the same thing. So it is with apples. If you have 

 anything new you had better get it on the market as quick as you 

 can because that same formation may appear in another place a 

 thousand miles away. You cannot tell them apart, and so there 

 is no need of putting them both on the market. A man who 

 comes upon the scene five or ten years afterwards with the same 

 variety apparently usually gets left, because the two varieties are 

 considered as the same thing. It happened so in the case of water 



