132 ANNUAL REPORT. 



to be adapted to this whole prairie region, clear up to Manitoba. 

 Trees have been doing well with me the past five years. Some 

 of my trees set three years ago have been fruiting some, and 

 have come through these hard winters in perfect condition. I 

 can see no reason why these apj)les, coining from a country much 

 further north than ours, and with conditions very much like 

 ours, should not be adapted to the climate here. There are no 

 orchards on this continent that will compare in extent with the 

 orchards which are to be found in Eussia. The whole business of 

 a considerable portion of this country seems to be the growing 

 of fruit in an open prairie country, and it is a business that is 

 successful. The Volga answers to the Mississippi and the Mis- 

 souri here; it drains a great prairie country, a rich prairie 

 country, and these apples grown on the Upper Volga are trans- 

 ported to Palestine and Southern Eussia, and there they find 

 their market. The people living in Palestine get their apples 

 from Eussia. Mr. Gibb tells me that they told him there that 

 their mildest winters the thermometer ranged lower than it does 

 here this winter. And that without a particle of snow on th(^ 

 ground the trees were preserved. 



It will take some time yet to try and determine the value of 

 these Eussian apples. I have some fifty varieties that I have 

 not fruited yet; I fruited some sixty last season and we expect 

 to find something among them that will be of value; we have 

 already found something that I know will be of value to this 

 whole Northwestern country. 



I have not come here to represent a nursery; I come here as a 

 fruit grower. My business has been fruit-growing for more than 

 thirty years; I try to throw aside my nursery business whenever 

 I go into a convention to talk fruit. My orders for these trees 

 are fifty times what I am able to suj^ply; I don't take one order 

 in fifty. I am not here to recommend any fruit for the purpose 

 of sale. I have already had too much notoriety on this Eussian 

 apple business through your reports and that of Iowa, and the 

 report of Mr. Gibb, of Canada. 



Col. Stevens. Have you raised the Eussian Transparent ? 



Mr. Tuttle. Yes, sir; it is the early apple 1 was speaking of. 

 I think there is some variation in this class of apples. Take 

 the White Transparent and the Yellow Transparent, I can see 

 no difference in the fruit. Whatever else we may find for 

 an early apple among the Eussians, I do not expect to find any- 

 thing better than that. It will be the early apple not only in 

 the Arctic regions but here as well. 



