36 MINNESOTA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY 
Mr. Dartt: I am not satisfied with the answer of my friend Harris 
in regard to the depth that a tree should be planted. The question 
was asked whether it should he planted below the line where the 
land had been plowed, and he objected to digging the hole below 
that line. I believe it is an absolute necessity that we should dig a 
hole as much as eighteen inches to two feet deep, and make a good 
mellow soil, and make a good bed, if it is two feet deep, and if three 
feet deep it will not do any harm, and then set out your tree. The 
moisture settles in there, and that is what we need in this climate. 
Such a hole holds the moisture and the tree will not die nearly so 
quick as if there was no moisture. There are some men who have 
had the best success by digging a large hole and making a good 
rich soil for quite-a distance around and planting the tree in there. 
I once raised a bushel and a half of apples from a tree three years 
after planting it. I dug a hole as much as six feet across and two 
feet deep,and I made a good bed and planted the treeinit. I 
planted the Pumpkin Sweet, and in three years after I planted that 
tree I picked one and a half bushels of apples from it. They were 
bouncing big apples, and I believe the more pains you take in mak- 
ing alarge hole and making the soil mellow, the better luck you 
will have. 
Mr. Moyer: Mr. Dartt wants to make the holes the width of the or- 
chard. 
Mr. Harris: I want to ask Mr. Dartt if he puts the roots clear down 
to the bottom of the hole. I do not care how wide or how deep he 
makes the hole if he puts the tree where he ought to put it; that is 
allright. It will do no harm to dig that kind of a hole until nature 
puts roots there, the kind she wants. There is no doubt but that is 
all right. Let me tell you in this connection there is a fellow down 
my way that sells trees. He thinks he knows all about the tree 
business. He set out two hundred trees last spring and some grew 
three or four inches and some died. JI asked him how deep he dug 
his holes. He said he dug his holes and put them down eighteen 
inches deep. You see he put them down in that hard clay subsoil, 
and there had been one heavy rain, and the rain and wind made a 
regular funnel around the tree and the tree leaned the way the wind 
blew last. 
Mr. Dartt: As long as that reporter over there is figuring the way 
he does I want to be careful what I say. I said I raised those ap- 
ples three years from the time of planting the tree, and I want to 
say it was four years. I do not want to make it too big. 
Pres. Underwood: We all thought he had gotten away from the 
truth. I understood him to say he raised the sweet pumpkin. We 
raise our pumpkins on vines. (Laughter.) 
Mr. Richardson: There is a great deal of difference in localities. 
You might dig a hole two or three feet deep and still the water 
would settle away. In our locality in the dry summers the ground 
is dust just as deep as it is plowed, and if we want to get at the 
moisture we must go below that point. I have had good success in 
planting deep; it works to a charm onthe prarie. I would rather do 
no mulching, unless I set the trees in sod. I have had good success 
in setting evergreens in sod by mulching. I set my evergreens 
