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THE LAND OF THE BIG RED APPLE. 377 
the glutting of certain markets and thus ensure better prices. 
About 10,000small fruit growers are represented in this country. 
The country is rapidly filling up with northern men, who expect 
to make fruit growing in some of its branches a specialty, and 
numbers of them willno doubt meet with disappointment, while 
the majority will do well. 
This choice fruit is not produced without using careful and intel- 
ligent means. Figs donot grow on thistles or grapes on thorns any 
better than in other countries, and weeds, briars and bush grow as 
spontaneously there as in Minnesota. The best paying orchards 
, are cultivated in hoed crops, while young, and as they get older the 
cow pea isa favorite crop for keeping up the fertility of the soil 
The peas are planted in rows and cultivated every few days, thus 
furnishing a dustin connection with the partial shade to the ground. 
Low-headed trees are much in favor, but in many of the newer 
plantations the trees are being set too close, both in rows and 
between rows. Itis an invention brought in from the north but a 
5 great mistake, as low heads and close planting buck against each 
other. 
The tree agent has been operating thereand practiced his art very 
much as he did in Minnesota. Honest and credulous farmers have 
oeen induced to purchase freely at exorbitant prices “budded trees,” 
whole-root grapes, Wolf River apples, the Rocky Mountain hybrid 
cherry and other fortune bringers. A careful examination of the 
budded tree shows that even in this favored clime it is not as good 
as the root-grafted, and other revelations are following as the vari- 
ous high priced fads begin to fruit. 
The area being planted to apples and peaches is increasing so 
rapidly that within the last four years it hasabout doubled up an- 
nually, and the numbers of trees can soon be counted in millions. 
From present appearance the day is. not far distant when there will 
be nearly a continuous orchard on either side of the Frisco road 
through Washington and Benton counties. : 
In peachés the best budded varieties are taking the preference 
over the seedlings. The newer apple orchards are being planted 
chiefly to the commercial varieties of winter apples, the Ben Davis 
still holding the most prominent place. It has been the money 
maker, but, in our opinion, will have to give place to some of the 
sweet varieties to satisfy a better educated taste. The Arkansas 
Black, Mammoth Black Twig, and Misssuri Pippin are popular va- 
rieties, and it is said that they have some newer seedlings that are 
about to make a sensation. 
KILLING SQUASH INSECTS.—Dissolve one-fourth pound of saltpeter 
in water. Make asmall ditch about the hills of cucumbers, squashes 
or pumpkins while the vines are small and pour in this solution of 
saltpeter. It will keep off striped squash bugs and kill the squash 
or flatiron bug which eats the vines.—O. J. Farmer. 
