278 MINNESOTA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY, 



Collegeville Trial Station. 



REV. JOHN B. KATZNER, SUPT. 



That the winter was cold need not to be mentioned, everyone 

 knows that, but we desire to call attention to a few points which 

 are of some interest to horticulture. It may not be known gen- 

 erally that we had 200 degrees more subzero weather than the 

 previous winter, footing up a total of 700 degrees below zero for 

 the winter of 1916-17. This material increase of cold is respon- 

 sible for the greater injury to trees than that of normal years. 

 We shall mention a few. 



The apples King David, Senator and Delicious topgrafted on 

 Hibernals are ruined, two-year-old Wealthy trees in the nursery 

 are frozen badly, some down to the ground, others have brown 

 wood; scarcely one escaped injury. Even Wealthy trees of bear- 

 ing age are seriously damaged. Plums Nos. 3, 20 and 15 froze 

 back two to eight inches and No. 27 lost some of the lower 

 branches entirely. Our sweet cherry tree, ten feet high, and the 

 Chinese pear No. 21923, which was considered entirely hardy, 

 are dead and gone. The old Wealthy trees and others of equal 

 hardiness suffered some from the long continued cold, but not 

 seriously. In regard to hardiness of trees one may get an object 

 lesson now in the orchard. Some apple trees make a healthy 

 growth, others only a feeble attempt. There are Chinese and 

 Pattens seedling pears growing vigorously, and among them 

 stand German pears frozen dead to the ground. Other plum and 

 pear trees were heeled in over winter, and nothing can be said 

 about their hardiness. Even bull pines up to eight feet were 

 seared as if by fire, but our variety is not of the hardy kind. We 

 had a fine ampelopsis engelmani, running up about twenty-five 

 feet on the south brick wall of the library building; today it is a 

 beauty of the past and dead to the ground. 



Having mentioned some of the trees which have been injured 

 by cold, it is no more than right to call attention to some varieties 

 on trial that were not injured last winter. Among these are all 

 the apple trees from the Minnesota Fruit-Breeding Farm, as Nos. 

 90, 271, 269, 16, 1, 7045, Gilbert, Winesap, Russet Seedling in the 

 nursery and the larger Malinda seedlings in the orchard. We 

 were agreeably surprised to find their wood perfectly healthy. 

 To these should be added the apple varieties listed of first degree 

 of hardiness and many kinds of the old and new plums in good 

 condition. Then mention should be made of the Chinese pears 



