STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 221 



Small fruits were plentiful. Heard a good deal of praise of the 

 sand cherry, transplanted from the Big Stone River bluff's to 

 gardens. Said to be prolific and of good quality. It is a low, 

 almost trailing shrub, looks some like a dwarf willow. Have 

 them in my garden, but did not see any fruit. Some of my 

 neighbors had plenty. Think it worthy of general trial. 



For the first time in my life I own a piece of land where the 

 soil is good for anything, and elevations, exposures, etc., adapted 

 to fruit growing. Had a good garden last summer. Kothiug in 

 it worthy of special mention except these: Cory sweet corn, ear- 

 liest, and the best early sweet I ever planted; Black Mexican 

 sweet, late but very prolific and good ; Stokes "extra early" wa- 

 termelon — not extra early, but the best melon to eat we ever had; 

 small, but even sized and prolific and a good keeper; Ironclad 

 watermelon, large, excellent for shipping; but for the most 

 pounds to the vine, and of excellent quality, the Excelsior heads 

 my list of eight varieties. Vick's Early yielded the largest speci- 

 men and a good one. All the rest on the vine inferior, and of 

 mixed characteristics; Miller's Cream Nutmeg, a splendid sort; 

 Bird cantaloupe, large, late but inferior quality. Seeds from 

 Gregory. 



I laid out a good orchard site last spring, and planted about 

 two hundred and twenty-five trees, one hundred of them from the 

 Jewell nursery, the rest, the best Russians I could get from 

 Prof. Budd and A. C. Tuttle; among them, Antonovka,. Yellow 

 Transparent, Arabskoe, Anis, etc., of the apples, and the Bes- 

 semionka; number three hundred and forty-seven of the pears; 

 Budd's Ostheim Cherry, several of his Russian plums, and the 

 Wolf and Speer native plums. Next planted a fewRollingstone 

 plums from O. M. Lord, with Weaver's that I brought with me. 

 Of strawberries I set out some varieties from J. T. Lovett; Glen- 

 dale, Parry, Warren, Sharpless, Jewell, Triomph de Gand and 

 Black Defiance. Old friends will smile to hear me confess I 

 haven't got a Wilson on my grounds. 



I live in a timbered gulch that runs east and west a mile on 

 the north side of my farm, and has thousands of wild plum trees 

 in it. I put in the most of my time last winter trimming these 

 plum trees and grubbing out a good many that were in the way. 

 Didn't seem to "set much store by them," but after the fruiting 

 season came on in the fall, I found we had a bonanza in wild 

 plums; there were about fifteen distinct sorts that were excel- 

 lent for hand eating or cooking, several of them freestones. 



