406 MINNESOTA STATE HORTICULTURAL, SOCIETY. 



EVERGREENS. 



A. NORBY, MADISON, S. D. 



Nowhere in this broad land is shelter more needed than here on 

 this vast plain, subject to fierce winds from all points of the com- 

 pass. For windbreaks, no trees are so well adapted as the pines, 

 cedars and spruces. Still these are yet very scarce in South Dakota. 

 Failures in raising them have been numerous, and only a small per 

 cent of the number planted are now alive. The reason lies in the 

 selection of varieties — natives of moist climates and localities with 

 twice or three times the precipitation we have — and also the lack of 

 proper care. Evergreens, as a rule, are planted in front of the dwell- 

 ings, where the ground is in grass and must of course remain so; 

 then mulched and sometimes watered. The mulch prevents all ex- 

 cept very heavy rains from reaching down to where it would do the 

 tree any good. A little water, however often applied, only wets the 

 surface, which in return generally turns hard and drys out all the 

 faster. Few have any idea how inuch water it takes to soak the dry 

 soil down to any depth. The sub-soil under grass covered grounds 

 unless soaked with water is as dry as ashes for months during the 

 dry periods, consequently few trees of any description survive. 



To make a success of raising evergreens the land must be deeply 

 plowed or spaded, well subdued, and after the trees are planted 

 thoroughly cultivated every season up to harvest time, and the 

 plants if small protected during the winter with any kind of rubbish 

 to hold the snow. 



In the fall of 1894 (the dryest season on record), the writer examined 

 the sub-soil to a considerable depth on the highest and apparently 

 dryest hill in the neighborhood, and found it surprisingly moist 

 nearly to the surface. On this hill stand today about one hundred 

 and fifty red cedars, six to eight feet high, every one a picture of 

 health and vigor, all the result of cultivation only. 



VARIETIES. 



Scotch pine is one of the fastest growers while young, but gives 

 little promise of becoming a long lived tree in this section; it leans 

 over to the north like the white willow, and the last winter proved 

 fatal to a large per cent of trees one to three feet high. 



The white pine is a much prettier tree, and when it thrives I don't 

 see why anybody wants to plant the Scotch, but here the hard winds 

 and dry cold winters are too much for it. South Dakota is evidently 

 not in the white pine belt. 



The red pine (Pinus resinosa) proved a disappointment, although 

 generally described as very hardy. Seventy-five per cent of two to 

 three feet trees, well established, were killed by the cold last win- 

 ter — by the cold and not by drouth, as some seem bound to have it. 

 Sinall spruces and firs a few inches high growing by their side]un- 

 der the same conditions nearly all came out alive. The last winter 

 proved an exceptionally trying one on evergreens, but the red pine 

 always shows more or less brown leaves and weakness inj the 

 spring and looks red indeed. 



Black Hills, or yellow, pine (Pinus ponderosa). This is the only 

 pine native of South Dakota and northwest Nebraska. It is the most 



