1 82 MINNESOTA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



and you will have your own stocks to work on and thus get good 

 trees. This stock is used in Germany and Russia in severe 

 locations, but not where it is unnecessary. 



Mr. A. F. Collman (Iowa) : I have lately had several orders 

 from Dakota, that great wheat country this side of the North 

 Pole, for fruit trees, and I would not recommend any varieties 

 because I did not know their conditions of soil and climate, but 

 I referred them all to Prof. Hansen. (Applause.) 



THINNING FRUIT. 



Question : What is the best way to thin fruit ? 



Prof. Hansen : Apples should be thinned when about half 

 the size of plums. To pick them ofif is about the only way I 

 know how to do it. 



Mr. Wilfert: I would like to ask whether any one has ever 

 tried spraying with salt water? I have seen that method rec- 

 ommended. They claim that it will kill the blossoms to a certain 

 extent. 



The Chairman : Prof. Beach has done work of that nature, 

 but it is not successful in certain cases. 



Mr. Busse : The cheapest and best thinner of fruit is a north- 

 west or west wind. That will thin it thoroughly well. 



Mr. Philips : A year ago last summer I was at Mr. Wedge's 

 place when he was thinning his fruit, and he was thinning it by 

 shaking the trees, but I noticed the best apples fell and the 

 small ones remained on the tree. 



The Chairman : I had the pleasure of going through the or- 

 chards at Benton Harbor, Michigan, last summer, where they 

 make a practice of thinning out to five inches apart, so that when 

 they get through you would say they have taken every peach on 

 the tree. The ground is- simply covered with green fruit. But 

 when their crop is matured they get so much better and larger 

 fruit that the thinning process pays them very well. They 

 get fully as much or more in bushels, and on account of the larger 

 size the fruit is worth considerably more. 



Mr. Kellogg: At what size do they do the thinning? 



The Chairman : When the fruit is about an inch in diameter. 



Mr. Elliot: About this thinning process. I will say briefly 

 that in an orchard of 300,000 peach trees, in a section of coun- 

 try where labor is cheap, they go over that orchard system- 

 atically when the peaches are about the size of a robin's egg. 

 and they thin them out so they stand from four to six inches 

 apart, claiming they get enough more in size and quality and 

 price to make up for all the trouble. To illustrate : Young Mr. 

 Hale, whose father owns the orchard I have just spoken 

 of, while engaged with his help in thinning peaches, was visited 

 by an old peach man, a man who had raised peaches all his life 

 and thought he knew all about- the business, who said to the 

 young man when he saw him thinning out those peaches. 

 "Young man, if you were ruining my peach trees like you are 



