APPLES. 193 



and within the last five years at least three-fourths have died 

 off in the same way Mr . Underwood's died . 



Prof. Green: I notice they suggest we should follow nature. 

 I do not like that term. I think man can improve on nature. 

 Nature is improving herself in everything all the time, and man 

 can go a great ways to improve nature. 



M. Pearce: I think all we can do is to assist nature. 



Geo. J. Kellogg: There are a good many points in the 

 paper; it is the best paper of this morning. That plan of set- 

 ting out the orchard, you cannot emphasize too much to your 

 farmer friends. 



E. H. S. Dartt: There is a point in Mr. Underwood's 

 paper that I think is somewhat important, and that is in regard 

 to the killing out of hard maple. He seemed to intimate that 

 it needed forest protection. I think that is a fact; at any rate, 

 in our section of the country the hard maple is not long lived. 

 It seems to do best where other trees are growing around it 

 and shading it. I think it is shown to be a fact that it needs 

 forest protection, that it needs shade. There are many other 

 varieties in the same list, but the hard maple is emphatically 

 one of that kind. 



APPLE GROWING AROUND LAKE MINNETONKA. 



BY A. W. LATHAM, EXCELSIOR, MINN. 



This title may include a history, a realization or a prophecy. The his- 

 tory of apple growing, which is as old as the settlement of the region, is 

 not a record of success as is most other branches of agriculture, but rather 

 a record of failure. What it teaches is rather how not to do than how to 

 do. It is better known what cannot be grown and how they cannot be 

 grown than what to grow or how to grow it. Such being the fact this 

 history is one of humiliation rather than of pride. The earliest settlers 

 of the region being from New England, the home of the apple, planted 

 freely the varieties that throve in the orchards of the land that gave 

 them birth, and apple seed by the bushel, in the case of some of the pio- 

 neers, was buried in hopes that kinds adapted to the region would arise 

 from its native soil. A succession of mild winters fostered hopes that 

 kinds had been found or originated that were equal to the demands of a 

 Minnesota winter. Hopes altogether vain. Where fifteen years ago were 

 thriving young orchards of Plumbs Cider, Fall Stripe, Ben Davis, 

 Duchess of Oldenburg, etc., and a multitude of thrifty seedlings, there 

 remain now only here and there, singly or in small groups, that faithful 

 friend, the Duchess of Oldenburg, still in the fight but badly shattered, 

 and occasional young orchards of Gideon's justly famous seedling, the 

 Wealthy. 

 -12 



