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_ + MINNESOTA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. ot 
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Candor compels me to say that when you find a muley cow climbing a tree 
stern-first, it will be up one of the trees so propagated on one of those tree 
claims. ' 
The Northern Pacific Railroad Co., expended a number of thousands of 
dollars in just about that sort of a way of propagating forest trees from 
cuttings, and succeeded in demonstrating that it was just as easy to drive a 
government mule through the eye of a needle, as to grow forest trees in any 
such way as that. 
The idea of getting something for nothing, isa bad one. There must be 
an equivalent, a quid pro quo. 
In your dealings with each other, this idea of something for nothing, may 
work, occasionally,—but you can’t bulldoze the prairie with any such non- 
sense. 
The cutting plunged full length into a deep, rich, mellow soil, under the 
vivifying influences of heat and moisture, soon begins to expand its buds, 
and throw outits slender, thread like, flbrous roots. If the ground has 
been properly prepared, those roots at once begin to draw nourishment for 
the incipient tree; the buds grow into branches, and in a few months you 
have a thoroughly developed forest tree, and the better cultivation you give 
this young tree, the sooner you get a tree that is of some use in the world. 
On the other hand, the cutting stuck in the raw sod, makes a failure in 
trying to get its roots into the hard earth in a vain attempt for nourishment ; 
struggles along in a feeble, quiet sort of a way till dry weather sets in, and 
then quietly starves to death without a struggle or a groan, and the innocent 
author of this miserable abortion wonders what ails his trees, and some- 
times gets mad, and uses ‘‘ cuss-words,” about the man who sold him the 
cuttings. 
To go back to the starting point: break your prairie in June; break shal- 
low—back set or cross-plow last of Sept. turning up two or three inches of 
fresh dirt. 
If ina hurry, (to save your claim) harrow thoroughly, and plant your 
cuttings right along up to the time the ground shuts up, and if not through, 
finish up the job early in the ensuing spring. If in no hurry it is good prac- 
tice to raise a crop before planting cuttings. A hoed crop is best, and if 
well cultivated leaves the ground in admirable condition for tree-planting. 
If you sow small grain before planting, you can’t be too careful in getting 
your seed perfectly clean. 
A few grains of wild buckwheat, or, what is more to be dreaded, pigeon 
grass, will give you an infinite amount of trouble, and by increased labor in 
keeping it down, double the cost of growing the forest. 
In growing a wind-break from cuttings, for a single row, I would prepare 
a strip of ground not less than 84 feet wide, by deep ploughing and thorough 
harrowing. 
I would have the ground as mellow as an ash-heap. 
I would draw a line lengthwise along the centre of this strip, and about 
every twelve to eighteen inches would plunge the cutting in nearly or quite 
full length, and at once tramp the mellow earth firmly around the cutting; 
and then I would keep that strip of ground clean as a hound’s tooth. I 
wouldn’t allow a weed or blade of grass to grow on that strip dedicated to 
the wind-break; and I should keep the cultivator running up and down the 
margin each side the row of young trees pretty often till harvest time, after 
