24 |  Annvat Report, 
impart to any home a charm and an attractiveness which nothing | 
at the same cost, can afford. The good taste and refinement of the 
are most happily evinced in the propagation of beautiful plants and 
ers in and about the home. More than this, your cemeteries, your st 
farms, your walks, your yards and courts are rendered more beautiful an& 
tive by a generous and judicious cultivation of shade and ornamental tree 
fact, I am happy to state, which is becoming more generally appreciated city — 
and country throughout the State. > See 
In the propagation of ornamental trees and of plants, the horticulturists of the — 
State have, I believe, met with general and gratifying success. Also, in the cul- 
tivation of the smaller finits, suited to our soil and climate satisfactory and 
profitable results have been realized ; but from the best information which 1 
have on this subject, I feel compelled to say that in apple raising, much f»ilure 
and loss have attended the best and most careful exertions of the nurserymen of 
the State. And yet, we are unwilling to believe that in a State celebrated all 
over the world for its remarkable fertility of soil and its large variety of produc- — 
tions, the apple cannot be successfully and profitably propagated. We are the 
_ more encouraged in this hopeful view from the improved results which we have 
witnessed in this direction within the past few years. Our horticulturists, profit- 
ing by experience, and acquiring knowledge through patient, intelligent investi- 
gation and effort, will demonstrate to us to-day that apples, fine, fair and lus-- 
cious, can successtully be grown in Minnesota. If you doubt this proposition, 
you should visit, in the proper season, the orchards and nurseries scattered all 
over the State, or attend the annual county fairs, and you will be convinced. 
There can be little or no doubt that many of the people of this State have been 
grossly cheated or deceived in the purchase of apple trees—I refer solely, to this 
kind of property which has been imported here from other States. In, perhaps, 
a majority of cases, varieties of trees not adapted to our soil and climate, have 
been selected, taken up without proper care and boxed up, or otherwise; these 
trees have been shipped to customers in Minnesota, and when they have arrived 
here, they wcre as utterly dead as a last year’s brush heap. For years this kind 
of trade went on, costing our farmers and others large sums of money, besides 
subjecting them to muck labor, cruel disappomtment and deep disgust. I do 
not mvntain that there was intentional fraud on the pact of the nurserymen in 
other states in these transactions ; all the parties may have been, and probably 
were, honest ; and yet, the ugly fact that our people paid out a good deal of 
money for apple trees and did not succeed in getting one in one thousand to live 
and thrive, remains undisputed. Possibly, apple trees started or propagated in 
another State, hundreds of miles away, may be brought here and cultivated with 
success, but I am of the opinion that it is not a safe or profitable mvestment. To 
be successful, even in a moderate degree, due reference must be had to the varie- 
ties selected and proper care in shipping and handling must be observed. How- 
ever,‘to me it seems that trees propagated entirely in the State will be found to 
be the only safe and reliable ones. 
IT have intimated that the culture of the apple in our State has thus far met 
with indifferent success. It is not the case, I believe, that any of the horticul- 
turists in the State have experienced as gratifying results in this regard as they 
could have wished, None have been wholly succéssful, neither have any to my 
knowledge, met with entire failure. In reference to the cause of failure, you, 
gentlemen, are much better qualified to instruct me than I am to enlighten you. 
You will, however, I know, pardon me tor briefly hinting at some of the main 
