APPLES. 97 



teen feet apart, and every other row I broke joints. You understand 

 I set them sixteen feet apart, and then in every other row I set one 

 in the space between, making- them nearly sixteen feet apart, so I 

 can drive mj^ team down the row and mulch them. I cultivate them, 

 and I intend to have them all grow. I intend to keep them there; 

 and if I had them scattered out over ten acres and cultivated some- 

 thing- else between, I would make a certain failure with my trees; 

 I would not take the same care of them I would if they were on a 

 smaller piece of ground. I mulch my trees every year to maintain 

 the moisture in the ground. This is essential to the growth of the 

 trees. You cannot expect to set out an orchard and have it grow 

 without special care; with that special care we can raise apples 

 and raise them in abundance in Minnesota without any trouble. I 

 have had an experience in this matter with fifty Duchess trees I 

 set out in 1860. They were set sixteen feet apart. The ground is 

 shaded all over, and it keeps the ground more cool, and, with the 

 mulching I put on, the limbs do not die out of those trees, and they 

 bear fruit right along to the very last branches. Now, in the winter 

 I take a sled and one horse and go through the rows and put a 

 mulch of long manure around my trees; I put this mulch around 

 every tree, and in that way I have never failed to raise a good crop 

 of apples every year for twenty years. This past year has been the 

 nearest to failure with me according to the number of trees I have 

 set out in that length of time. 



There was some talk here of not having a windbreak around the 

 orchard. My experience differs altogether from that. We have no 

 timber in our part of the state within ten miles of where I live, and 

 you cannot raise an orchard there unless there is a windbreak around 

 it. At no time this winter, the way my orchard stands, has the ther- 

 mometer run below 10° below zero, while on the prairie it has been 

 as low as 50°. And there is another thing, it keeps the apple on the 

 tree until it is fully matured, where, if the orchard was exposed to 

 the wind, it would blow off one-half of the fruit. 



Mr. Brand: My friend from Owatonna boasts about the great ex- 

 perience he has had, the large number of trees he has planted, the 

 long number of years he has been engaged in planting trees and 

 the way he plants. It is like the philosopher's scales; the one man 

 who has had experience with one tree and has produced the largest 

 quantity of apples out-weighs all that he has done. We had refer- 

 ence to that last night in the quiet work of the investigator and the 

 introducer of new varieties — anj'^thing that tends to improve the con- 

 dition of man. It is not the large amount of work he does, but the 

 way he does his work and the kind of work he does. My observa- 

 tions have been very extensive, but I am not going to speak of my 

 own experience entirely, although it has extended over a good many 

 years. 



With reference to the distance trees are planted apart and the 

 value of them, I have always found those trees grew the best that 

 had the most room, and, if I were to single out instances, I might 

 mention two trees in this state which have produced the most fruit 

 of any trees I know of. One is a Duchess, which produced twenty- 



