280 ANNUAL REPORT. 



tained perfect foliage, and have been unharmed by the test winter. 

 In like manner the Flemish Beauty pear has not had for the past 

 two summers a single leaf free from brown fungus on the under 

 surface, and last winter the trees were either wholly killed or so 

 lowered in vitality as to be really worthless. The Besi de la Motte, 

 from the edge of the great eastern steppe, has maintained healthy 

 foliage, but its wood was slightly colored by the test winter, yet it 

 has made rapid and healthy growth the past summer. The Besse- 

 mianka, Trukavetka, and other pears from central Russia, have 

 maintained perfect foliage — except slight injury by the pear leaf 

 mite — and the terminal points of the shoots were as clear and 

 bright last spring as the wood of the Russian poplars. Our apples 

 of the grade of hardiness of Ben Davis, Jonathan and Dominie, 

 were defective in leaf for the past two years, and last winter were 

 irreparably ruined. On the other hand, our old varieties from the 

 east plain, or their descendants, and over two hundred varieties re- 

 cently imported, started from the terminal points where grown on 

 rich garden soil. 



Yet our collection is too varied for any one experimental station 

 of the West, as it embraces varieties which will do best in the Mis- 

 souri belt, and varieties which should do best in the belt of North 

 Dakota and Minnesota. If the experimental work could be dis- 

 tributed, and each of the belts across the valley I have tried to in- 

 dicate could experiment with the products of its corresponding 

 section of the east plain, the work could not fail to result in ad- 

 vancing our horticultural interests. So far, in talking of Russian 

 fruits, we have not taken into account the enormous extent of the 

 empire. We do not want the fruits of St. Petersburg, or of any 

 part of the coast section within 300 miles of the Baltic. That we 

 do want the fruits of the provinces named in this connection, I am 

 equally certain, if properly distributed over our great valley. We 

 must never forget that we must have in our valley, from the Mis- 

 souri belt northward, varieties of all the fruits that will maintain 

 perfect health of foliage, or we cannot expect paying crops of per- 

 fect fruit. A tree may endure our winters passably well, yet on 

 account of leaf trouble during our dry hot summers, fail to de- 

 velop the cell structure in the wood in the perfect way needed for 

 holding and perfecting the fruit crop. With the advent of varie- 

 ties as perfect in leaf as the Duchess apple, the Bessemianka pear, 

 and the Vladimir cherry, we may expect a show of blossoms to be 

 followed by perfect fruit. 



