REPORT ON FRUIT BLOSSOMS. 363 



REPORT ON FRUIT BLOSSOMS IN 1896. 



L. R. MOYER, MONTEVIDEO, MINN. 



At Montevideo, spring opened unusually early. The pasque-flower 

 was in bloom early in April. On April 26, Peucedanum nudicaule 

 was in blooni^ By April 30, the buffalo berry had shed its pollen. 

 On May 3, the green ash and the Juneberry were both in bloom. Six 

 days of very hot weather ensued. On May 5, the mercury rose to 

 87°, and the wind began to blow from the south-southwest. The 

 next day the temperature rose to 89 c, and the wind continued to 

 blow the same hot southwesterly gale. On Maj'' 7 and 8, the maxi- 

 mum temperature was 88° each day, and on May 9 and 10, it was 

 only two degrees cooler, the same hot southwest wind blowing all 

 the time. On May 11, the temperature had fallen to 80°, and a slight 

 shower of rain fell. It was during the middle of thishot week, when 

 the simoon was at its height, that the plums and currants bloomed. 

 The bloom lasted but a few hours and then disappeared. The flow- 

 ers had been literally parched and burned up. There was conse- 

 quently no plum crop, except on a few of the most sheltered trees. 

 The currant crop, too, was nearly a failure. 



These hot southwest winds are becoming more prevalent on the 

 prairie year by year, and they are, perhaps, more destructive in the 

 early spring than at any other season. The reason is obvious 

 enough. Western Minnesota is now an immense wheat field. In the 

 early spring all the land is under cultivation; the harrow and the 

 seeder are pulverizing it, and it lies naked and desolate. The soil is 

 a light, sandy loam, and there is no vegetation to protect it, A storm 

 center develops— we will say in the Canadian northwest — and moves 

 slowly eastward. If the "low" lingers for several days over Lake 

 Winnipeg and Lake Superior, western Minnesota and South Dakota 

 are then sure to get south and southwest winds, and the velocity of 

 those winds will be measured by the intensity of the "low." The 

 dust left by the harrow and the seeder rises into the air when the 

 wind first begins to blow. As the dust is blown away, the particles 

 of sand lie naked everywhere and become intensely hot in the noon- 

 day sun. The wind increases in violence, and the particles of hot 

 sand are swept along before the blast. The simoon is then at its 

 height, and before its pestilential breath all vegetation withers. It 

 was such a storm which struck the plum blossoms last spring. 



Our prairie fruit plantations must be protected from these winds. 

 In my opinion a shelter belt on the south and southwest sides of 

 our gardens and orchards is absolutely indispensable. The practice 

 of draining our prairie lakes and sloughs ought to be stopped. 

 There should be more grass land and less spring wheat on our 

 prairie farms. Our timber plantations ought to be renewed and 

 extended ever5'where; our short-lived soft maples, cottouwoods and 

 box elders ought to be replaced by solid, substantial trees, such as 

 green ash and bur-oak. It must be understood, too, that the trees 

 on the prairies need to be well cultivated for a long series of years. 

 Western Minnesota shows hundreds of groves of dead and dying 

 trees; but if you will examine those groves j'ou will find in them a 



