■64 ANNUAL REPORT. 



Mr. Kramer. My Snyder berries froze down to the ground, and 

 that portion which had naturally fallen down and laid flat on the 

 ground, came out all right and the bushes are now just loaded with 

 berries; the canes which are an inch or more in diameter are all gone, 

 but the saxall limbs which were on the ground were saved. 



Mr. Harris. I had a similar experience with grapes, the vines that 

 lay upon the ground were not injured, but I did some pruning in 

 November before the ground was covered with snow, and among those 

 a good many vines were killed almost to the ground. That indicates 

 that there must have been injury done before the extreme cold, before 

 the time when the thermometer went down into the thirties below 

 zero. 



Mr. Kramer. I have grape vines, I think, four inches in diameter 

 which were f I ozen clear to the ground. I have some seedlings that 

 are good grapes, and I laid some of the vines on the ground and they 

 are full of fruit at the present time, but everything that has been up 

 three or four inches in the atmosphere is all gone. 



Mr. Pearce. I did not make the suggestion to recommend the 

 practice as I expect to try it a little further. I have Concord grapes 

 that kept to perfection without covering, by simply laying the vines 

 upon the ground. 



Mr. Kramer. I think they will; the soil keeps them from killing. 

 If they are on the ground it makes no difiTerence how cold it is; there 

 is where they want to be. 



Mr. Pearce. I think it well for the Society to experiment on these 

 things. I tried the same thing with roses and am inclined to think 

 they will keep if laid flat on the ground. 



Mr. Harris. I have two of the Prairie Queen rose bushes; one of 

 them my wife asked me to take down early in the fall, and I did so; 

 the other I did not lay down until about the first of December; that 

 was entirely dead in the spring, while the other was perfectly sound. 

 It ought not to have been cold enough to injure it, but I think the 

 portions that were exposed when we had our first freeze must have 

 been hurt. 



Mr. G. S. Woolsey. That is not my experience with the rose bush. 

 I have prairie ground and the snow blows off; I cover the bushes and 

 in the spring take them out and they are bright and clean; where they 

 are exposed they are bright but dead. 



Mr. Elliott. My experience in covering is this: whenever we get 

 plenty of snow that will ordinarily cover them and keep them from 



