460 MINNESOTA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



had not borne much the preceding year. In one locaHty applv 

 blossoms covered from insects bloomed one to three days longer 

 than uncovered ones; pear blossoms four to five days longer; and 

 plum blossoms four to six days. No fruit set on the covered apple 

 boughs and less on the covered pear and plum boughs than on the 

 uncovered ones, much of which fell off prematurely. In another 

 locality the experiment was tried on an almond tree, a pear and a 

 cherry, which bore fruit in abundance on the uncovered branches. 

 All the covered blossoms remained m bloom longer, but none de- 

 veloped, except one of the almond blossoms, apparently because it 

 rubbed against the covering, and this withered without a kernel. 

 In the third locality, two covered apple boughs bloomed three days 

 longer than the others, and no fruit developed, while the uncovered 

 branches bore in abundance. In the other four localities the ex- 

 periments and results were so similar it is not worth while to men- 

 tion them particularly. The whole forms a convincing proof that 

 insect aid is necessary to the fruit industry. — Bee-Keepers' Review. 



It is a truth demonstrated beyond question, by Darwin and by 

 many other scientists, by our Department of Agriculture and by 

 my own experiments, that many flowers are sterile to their own 

 pollen or to that of the same variety of fruit. It is also true that 

 pollination is always necessary to seed production, and usually to 

 the production of the pulp in case of our berries, pomes, drupaceous 

 fruits, etc. There seems as little doubt but that some fruits usually 

 or sometimes fertile to their own pollen, or to that of the same 

 variety, are under less favorable circumstances sterile to the same. 

 Thus, the Bartlett pollen, though occasionally under favorable cir- 

 cumstances it fruits well though no Other pears are in the vicinity, 

 yet in these exceptional cases no one knows when the tide will turn, 

 and the Bartlett fail to produce unless other pears are hard by to 

 insure cross-pollination. We are sure, then, that mixing of fruits 

 so as to secure cross-pollination is absolutely essential in almost 

 all cases to the best success, and in a large proportion of cases to 

 any success at all. 



Again, this cross-pollination requires insects to carry the pollen 

 grains from the anther of one bloom to the stigma of another. Be- 

 fore the. orchards were planted the fruits were less numerous, and 

 the solitary scant-insects were sufficient to do the work; but as we 

 mass the fruits in great orchards, the native solitary insects were all 

 too few, and fortunately the social bees were brought along with the 

 fruits. Even the social native insects, like the social wasps and 

 bumble-bees, are very few in spring when the fruits bloom, and so 



