292 ANNUAL REPORT 



showed signs of discouragement, and an inclination to give up the 

 struggle for existence. Each returning spring showed fewer living 

 trees, and those in worse condition. There are now perhaps a dozen 

 of them "cumbering the ground," but their days of usefulness are 

 past. They blossom well but the apples are like angel's visits. A 

 word about the Yellow Siberian. They have always been at home, 

 have made a vigorous growth every year and are now between thirty 

 and forty feet in height with trunk two and one-half feet in circum- 

 ference. These trees were set in a rich black loam ten to twelve inches 

 deep, underlaid with coarse gravel, and then sand to an unknown 

 depth. 



For the first few years my orchard promised so well that I was 

 tempted to venture too far. In 1873 I exchanged eighty acres of land 

 in Sherburne county with Shearman, a nursery man of Rockford, 111., 

 for apple trees. This gave me 32,000 root grafts and 1,000 two-year- 

 olds of most of the kinds recommended for trial by the Minnesota Hor- 

 ticultural Society. Nearly all of these I planted myself, nursing and 

 caring for them till most of them died a natural death. The kinds 

 were Transcendent, Hyslop, Duchess, Red and White Astrachau, Te- 

 tofsky, Fameuse and others. Of these probably 500 Transcendents and 

 half a dozen Hyslops are alive to-day, most of the Transcendents in 

 fair condition. Three or four Duchess trees, planted on the north side 

 of the house and within three feet of it, look bright and sound from 

 the ground to the topmost branches, but they do not bear a peck of 

 apples a year. Probably they are in too cool and shady a place. So 

 it seems that the conditions essential to healthy growth are decidedly 

 unfavorable to fruit-bearing. 



Out of several hundred seedlings which I have raised, all are now 

 dead but three These are about fifteen years old and apparently as 

 hardy as the Siberians. Transcendents, Hyslops, Early Strawberries, 

 Orions, Hebrons, and all the so-called iron-clads have been winter- 

 killed around them, but these are all as sound as oaks. One is a seed- 

 ling of the Duchess and the other two sprung from the original stock 

 when the root grafts died. Hardiness however is their only good qual- 

 ity. The fruit, though considerably larger than the Siberian, is 

 scarcely better than that of the Hyslop, and that is placing it low 

 enough. The fact that by years of experimenting we can make some 

 improvement in quality and still retain the absolute hardiness of the 

 crab is encouraging. Others have done very much better than I have, 

 an4 the end is not yet. Every year will add its quota, and in the 

 "good time coming" some one will give us an apple as good as the 

 Wealthy and as hardy as the Yellow Siberian. 



