THE MINNESOTA 



HORTICULTURIST. 



VOL. 24. FEBRUARY, 1896. NO. 



ANNUAL MEETING IOWA STATE HORTICULTURAL 

 SOCIETY, 1895. 



S. n. RICHARDSON', \\ INN KBAC.O CITY, DELEGATE. 



The thirtieth annual nieetin<j of the Iowa State Horticultural So- 

 ciety was held in their rooms in the basement of the capitol at Des 

 Moines. The rooms were tastefully decorated with holly and ever- 

 green vines, and one end of the table occupied by the president and 

 secretarj- was covered with apples. A large cone, some three feet 

 high, was covered with red and yellow apples on the outside, and a 

 large bowl of American Beauty roses in front of the president was 

 very fine. In the outer room was a large display of plants, roses 

 chrysanthemums, etc., which attracted much attention. 



The display of apples in the basement of the rotunda was very 

 large, some 2,000 plates. The college at Ames had a good display of 

 Russian apples and there were some from Storni Lake. W. C. Havi- 

 land, of Fort Dodge, had a table of Duchess, but the bulk of the dis- 

 play was from central and southern Iowa, composed mostly of Am- 

 erican varieties. Tlie Wealthy is a summer apple in southwestern 

 Iowa and is not hardy — there seems to be a southern as well as a 

 northern limit to many varieties of the apple. Perhaps this is the 

 reason that the Russians are not more popular in Iowa. The fact 

 that elevation is a factor as well as latitude in determining the loca- 

 tion of varieties, was very apparent to your delegate. From the 

 south line of the state of Minnesota 100 miles down hill to the north, 

 there seems little difference in varieties or climate, but the same dis- 

 tance down hill to the south makes a marked change in both. 



The meeting was well attended, and there were a large number of 

 nur.serymen and persona growing fruit for market present. Space 

 will not permit of even a brief synopsis of the papers read and dis- 

 cussed, and I will only present a few pointsgleaned while listening 

 with both ears open for something of practical use to us in the 

 North. Mr. W. M. Bomberger read the only paper of the morning 

 session, "Top-grafting the Apple in Commercial Nurseries." His 

 paper was especially valuable for nuraerj-men. He would mix 

 colors and varieties on the same tree so as to combine beauty and 

 utility in the same tree for village gardens. Discussion brought out 

 the fact that the Haas is very popular as a stock in central Iowa. 

 The testimony seemed to be almost unaninious in favor of topwork- 

 ing for commercial orcharding. 



Prof. Budd claimed that what is known as the Virginia Crab is 

 not a crab but the wild apple of Russia and that it came from there 

 to Virginia by the way of the botanical gardens at Kew. At a later 



