NURSERY CULTURE OF THE APPLE. 841 



that it is always a little drier than it should be in this climate ; hence 

 we have root-killing more than we ought to have ; in fact, we have 

 root-killing almost every winter. On Mr. Kimball's place there was 

 severe root-killing where there was a very heavy growth of weeds. 



Mr. Wyman Elliot : What is the soil ? 



Mr. Wedge : Our soil has a yellow clay subsoil. It is a glacial 

 formation. The surface of the soil is a clay loam, with a good yellow- 

 clay subsoil. No gravel, nothing of that sort, a very retentive soil. 

 A \ear ago this past winter my chief loss was where the soil was 

 particularly moist, where the snow had happened to blow ofif and 

 given an exposure. There was a reasonable amount of moisture in 

 the soil generally, and it proved to my mind conclusively that a 

 reasonable amount of moisture in the soil w^as not a sure preventive 

 against root-killing. But that was a low temperature without any 

 cover. 



I want to ask Air. Patten this question : I am somewhat in- 

 clined to be taken with this fever of hardier .stock, and it occurs to 

 me, as near as I can learn, that there has been no experiment tried 

 that would exactly combat Prof. Hansen's idea that trees budded at 

 the surface, Siberian stock, would not make good union and good 

 roots for our common commercial varieties. Mr. Patten knows 

 there is something peculiar about the collar. For instance, you can 

 put the common wild plum at the surface of the ground on the col- 

 lar on the little sand cherry, and it will make a very passable job, but 

 if you put the plum up six or eight inches on the sand cherry it will 

 fall over. 



2\Ir. C. G. Patten : Will k be fruitful when it makes a union ? 



]Mr. Wedge : Yes, I have found it so. The trees wall make a 

 good union at the collar but not above. The question I want to ask 

 is this : Has this experiment of Prof. Hansen's ever had a trial 

 in the United States? 



Mr. C. G. Patten : I think it has. I think in our experiments 

 in top-working that question has been practically answered, and 

 that, as Col. Watrous has said, any experiment of that kind is only 

 an experiment and should be so regarded. I think it has been 

 demonstrated from the fact, as I said before, whether you graft low 

 down, below the ground, or whether you graft two, three or four 

 feet up on the Siberian crab, on both we find that while one Siberian 

 will unite three feet from the ground very nicely with a given variety 

 of apple, another variety placed upon that Siberian will not unite, 

 and you must place that down within a foot of the ground, and the 

 reason it will not do to place them down upon the ground I sub- 

 stantially stated before. There is a growth going on continually be- 

 tween the roots and the scion, and if there is so wide a difference be- 

 tween the root and the scion it will certainly dwarf the root and 

 dwarf the scion, and if the top is dwarfed it will render it unfruit- 

 ful, certainly on my ground. Now% to show you that it will not 

 do to grow orchards in this way, I will give you an illustration that 

 came under my observation and in my own experience in producing 

 seedlings from one of the Hesper hybrids, a large hybrid. I grew 



